


A Method to Their Madness

by larkofchaos



Category: Dungeons and Daddies (Podcast)
Genre: Asexual Character, Gen, Genderfluid Character, Genderfluid Nick Close, Give Grant a boyfriend 2020, I didn't mean for there to be Nick/Terry, M/M, Nick/Terry if you squint ngl., Slow Burn, Trans Male Character, but Nick takes on a mind of their own when I write them so like, here's that kai content i promised the discord, kid-centric, they're in highschool
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:28:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 55,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26091904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/larkofchaos/pseuds/larkofchaos
Summary: When Kai moved from his little nowhere town in rural Kentucky to California, he didn't expect to find his long term internet friend Grant Wilson in the same town as him. After struggling to make himself a place in his new school for two weeks, Grant dragged him by his feet into his hodge-podge friend group of five kids with varying levels of parental issues.The adventure of a new city delves into madness when Grant sloppily admits a crush, and a former life in a whole other dimension? And now they're taking Kai into it with them for one last hoorah?
Relationships: Darryl Wilson & Grant Wilson, Grant Wilson (Dungeons and Daddies)/Original Male Character(s), Lark Oak & Sparrow Oak, Nicolas Close & Grant Wilson, Nicolas Close & Lark Oak & Sparrow Oak & Terry Jr. & Grant Wilson, Nicolas Close & Original Character(s), Terry Jr. & Grant Wilson (Dungeons and Daddies)
Comments: 22
Kudos: 31
Collections: Son-Centric Fanfics





	1. the one where he learned his best friend lives down the block

**Author's Note:**

> I literally don't know if The DnDads gang is canonically in San Dimas, but judging from Rocks Rock! they are and that's what I'm going with and I'm not changing it now.

Moving across the country was always a difficult task, especially for a country boy from Nicholasville, Kentucky receiving the culture shock of San Dimas, California. Really, the only similarity between Westrock High and West Jessamine High was the ‘west’ in the name. It had been two weeks since school started, and he had still not met a single person. Mom kept trying to get him to join clubs or the school play, or whatever. But, Kai was not interested in any of these options. He liked sitting at home on his evenings playing on random games with ‘wish_granted’ aka, Grant. A fellow gamer he’s been playing online with since Fortnite back in seventh grade. 

Ironically, that was exactly what he was doing at this very moment. He plopped onto the couch in his small apartment he shared with his mom and dog and logged onto the game. He could pick out Grant’s voice, but the other guy online sounded laid back and like he didn’t care about dying. He put on his headset and adjusted the mic, subconsciously making his voice lower cause he didn’t know this ‘StonerCloseBy’ 

“Hey, Grant. Who’s the new guy?” He asked, logging into the game. Tonight was fucking around in Call of Duty on PVP, Grant had decided that on Discord earlier in the day. 

“Yo! Kai! This is Nick, they’re one of my IRL’s. They’re chill. They’re chill. No need to do the voice with them.” It’s like a weight was lifted off Kai’s shoulders. He didn’t even realize he had been doing his default “call voice.” The one he always did when he joined the Discord call and didn’t know one of the members to avoid them misgendering him. He couldn’t wait till his mom got him back on track for hormones. The move fucked that plan up real bad. He let his voice go back to its normal state, not much higher pitch, but enough that he didn’t quite pass as a cis dude. 

“Okay, neat. Hi, Nick.” 

“Sup, my dude.” Without blinking, Kai shot Grant when he wasn’t paying attention. That is the point of Player Versus Player, is it not? 

“Awe! God dammit, Kai!” Kai heard some voice from the background of Grant’s mic, someone saying something to him with which Grant responded, “Sorry, Dad! So, anyway. Kai, we haven’t talked much since you moved. How’s that going for you? Where are you in the world, now?” Grant asked, as the three more of just tried to kill each other in increasingly strange ways than actually play the game, but where's the difference? 

“Yeah. We’re in San Dimas, Cali now. It’s hell on earth trying to find a social group. But, it’s whatever.” There was an odd silence for a moment, and Kai feared he said something wrong. 

“Kai… I told you I live in San Dimas, right? Like, you were aware of this?” 

Grant heard a controller and headset hit the floor and a loud, “HOLY FUCKING SHIT!” from Kai’s end of the call. Which made him laugh a little harder than it should have. It was always off-putting when Kai yelled out profanity like that. He had this soft baby face and braces, and fluffy hair that looked like a cloud. Kai usually got mistaken for a seventh grader and not a whole ass high school sophomore. 

“I think you broke him, Wilson.” 

“I dunno, Close. Maybe he’s just rebooting.”

“Kai.exe has stopped working.” 

“Okay. Okay. I’m back. I’m back. I have so many questions for you, Grant. This is some cliche fanfiction type deal.” 

“Mine and Grant’s entire lives sound like some cheesy fanfiction type shit, Kai. I don’t know if you know this, but Grant almost dated a guy named Ye-”

“We do NOT speak his name, Nicolas. Your daddy’s named GLENNJAMIN.” 

“OKAY, GRANT YOU DID NOT HAVE TO DRAG POPS INTO THIS! BECAUSE ONE; NO, THAT'S A FUCKING JOKE AND TWO; YOU’RE EX IS LITERALLY NAMED-”

“I’M NOT LISTENING! LA LA LA LA!” 

Kai, admittedly, did not know what was happening in this conversation. It seemed like inside jokes between two long-term friends. He knew Grant had held the same four friends in his personal life since second grade, and if Nick was one of those four like he said, there was also an abundance of inside jokes that had so many layers to them Kai never may learn the context for all of them. 

“Okay, okay. Back on topic. Kai, do you go to Westrock?” Grant asked, starting another round of friendly virtual murder. 

“Yeah.” Kai focused on getting a kill on Nick. He hadn’t gotten to kill them yet, they were super good at evading his attacks and Kai Levesque would not be taken down so easily. 

“Oh, awesome. What time do you have lunch? And, what class do you come from?” In his focus to get Nick, Kai didn’t see Grant coming up behind him and got blown the fuck up. Nick 1, Kai 0. 

“12:30, and I come from Mr. Hart’s history class.” 

“Oh, I’m so sorry. Mr. Hart’s and asshole.” Nick chimed in. Kai could hear the grin in their voice from getting one over on him. 

“Nick, who’s in that hall? I know we got one of the boys there.” Kai started button mashing behind Nick to throw as many weapons and attacks at them as possible, essentially just spamming the living hell out of the “shoot” button to get at least one shot on Nick to kill the sick bastard. 

“L.o.C has Mrs. Groves, so they could swing by there pretty easily.” Lock? Kai’s never heard of a ‘Lock’ in Grant’s friend group before now, but maybe they’re a new addition. 

“Do we really want Kai’s first impression of the gang to be L.o.C, though?” 

“I could always just send Sparrow after him. Sparrow’s usually chill without Lark there to instigate utter madness.” Kai felt like an awkward third party watching a couple makeout. Because he has definitely been that awkward third party before. 

“Who are these people?” He asked, a bit sheepishly if he’s being totally honest. Both of them seemed to realize they had gone off in tangents and completely forgotten to inform Kai of any of the context of this conversation. 

“Sorry, Kai! Sorry. Lark and Sparrow are called L.o.C for reasons I’ll explain later, anyway. They’re a set of twins in my friend group. They’ll probably snatch you after your fourth period, just wait for them out in the hall. If you see a pair of identical Latino being exceptionally loud in various languages, it's them.” Grant explained, managing to get himself bombed by a mine he stepped on in-game. Nick cackled at him evilly, “Wilson, you dumbass!” 

\-----------------------------------------

Do you ever meet someone, and have a certain expectation of them before you meet them and then you meet them and they meet that expectation so perfectly you're scared you were so dead on with it? Well, that’s where Kai is with the Oak-Garcia twins. When Grant said ‘they’ll cause absolute mayhem while speaking in four different languages fluently and somehow still have perfectly clean school records.’ Kai thought he was being a little over dramatic, but no. He was exactly right. He didn’t know what language Lark was speaking to his brother in, but it certainly wasn’t any Kai had heard before. 

He found himself stuck between the two twins, and the halls parted like a sea as they walked through. Lark had his hands clasped behind his head, walking like one of those eccentric anime characters who thought they were The Shit, while his brother had one hand tucked in his pocket and was chewing on his nails with the other. Kai couldn’t help but notice how unusually pointed their ears were and how their green eyes almost glowed. Were their green eyes even genetically possible? Honestly the only reason Kai could tell which one was Lark and which one was Sparrow was because they were aesthetic-coded. Lark was walking glitchcore and Sparrow was a strange mix of ‘basic straight boy’ and cottagecore. 

“No, see, dear brother. If that were true than that would mean our father, is in fact, a heterosexual. And we both know that is quite  _ false, _ given the way him and Darryl have kissed- what’s the counter at now?” Sparrow explained, switching to a language Kai could understand. Though, that did not mean Kai had any more understanding of where this conversation was. 

“Why, beloved Sparrow, I do believe we are up to twelve whole times Henry Oak and Darryl Wilson have smooched.” 

“Twelve times. And no straight man kisses his ‘totally platonic guy friend’ twelve times.” At this point, they were nearing the rest of the friend group which meant Grant could rescue him from this trainwreck of a situation. What were these two even talking about? Wasn’t Grant’s dad named Darryl? 

“Dammit, Sparrow! I told you not to have Lark with you when you picked up Kai!” Grant groaned. Kai knew Grant. Kai did not know the punk woman sitting next to Grant or the oddly put together teenage boy across from Grant. 

Kai got ushered to sit on the other side of Grant, and the twins sat across next to the boy in the green t-shirt and black unbuttoned button down over it. This friend group was an absolute disaster of people, but Kai liked friends that way. 

This goth lady who looked like she could end Kai’s whole career with a flirty smile and a wink was the first one to greet him. She leaned forward and reached over Grant to shake his hand. Did people really still shake hands? 

“Dope to meet you in person, Kai. I’m Nick. Your local goth gay genderfluid guitarist. Love the pink hair, by the way.. Looks like cotton candy.” She did not say genderfluid how it’s properly pronounced, instead of j sound like in proper English, she pronounced the g just like in the other three g words surrounding it. Which was, honestly, kind of amusing. Kai didn’t get a chance to thank her for the comment on his hair colour someone else said something

“Nickie, doll, you play drums.” the still nameless boy said, taking a long drink of his soda before setting it back down and flashing Kai a kind smile. “I’m Terry Junior, or Terry, or TJ, or Teej. I’m a man of many names. Just call me whatever you like.” 

“Vamp, if you correct me on quadruple g catchphrase one more time I will end you, I play guitar AND drums.” Nick butted in, pointing an accusatory finger at Terry Junior. Maybe Kai will just call him TJ, that seems much easier. 

“Nickie, Flower, I will never not correct your quadruple g catchphrase. Glenn plays guitar and you play drums, that’s how this whole dynamic works. You can’t fuck it up four years in!” TJ popped a chip into his mouth, leaning on the table. TJ and Nickie just glared at each other for a solid few seconds, staring into each other's souls before both burst out laughing at nothing and fell back into this graceful rhythm of the twins saying something a mi languages, and the rest of the friends snapping back. 

Nickie rolled her eyes at something Sparrow had said in that t-h heavy language, leaning back in her chair. “Sparrow, you’re being a total Walter right now and it’s not cashmoney, my guy.” Which launched the other four into fits of laughter and leaving Kai totally clueless to what was happening once more. He knew it was gonna take awhile for him to learn the ins and outs of this group, but if he had a group of people to hang out with and chat with, he was willing to take that time to learn.


	2. The one where he got dunked in a pool

As soon as Kai got home from school that day, his mother was on him with another impromptu game of twenty questions. He loved his mom, no doubt. She was absolutely fantastic in every way and supports Kai in any endeavor he may follow, but sometimes Kai just wanted a moment alone. But, in their one-room apartment that alone time was nearly impossible to achieve. He couldn’t get mad at Mom for wanting to talk to him as soon as he got home, usually as he came in she was heading out the door for her job. 

“How was school, baby? Meet that kid you were telling me about?” She pressed a kiss to his head as soon as he walked in, giving him a hug and holding a little longer than a normal hug lasts. His mom had always been like this, overly protective and affectionate at all hours. He thinks it has something to do with his dad, but he was too young to remember the sperm donor, so who cares about him. Mom hasn’t mentioned him for the entirety of Kai’s memory, so Kai figured he didn’t matter. Mom was all he needed. 

“It was good, Mama. Grant’s friends are a bit much, but I’ll get used to them. It’ll take me a bit to get used to the twins, though.” He pushed passed her to grab a snack from the fridge. His mom had a bad habit of keeping  _ too much _ food in the house. 

“What do you mean by that, Key?” Mom inquired, leaning on the counter and snagging a banana from the bunch on the counter. She always asked questions about everything, wanted to know every detail of every story. Jeanne Levesque was the definition of a mama bear over Kai, and it came in handy when he got in rough spots. A year or so ago they made a code word for when she had to tell him he couldn’t go somewhere so he could easily get out of it. 

“They’re just strange characters, but the good kind. Anyway, um, Grant wants me to come to some get together they’re all having with them and their parents this Saturday, also said to invite you along too. I guess so their parents can meet you? I dunno.” He shrugged, pulling out a yogurt cup and reaching behind his mom to get a spoon so he can enjoy his yogurt. 

“Do you want me to go, or are you scared I’m gonna embarrass you in font of your new dope friends?” She nudged him playfully, a warm grin on her face.

“You know I don’t care, Mama. It’s up to you.” He shrugged, shovelling another spoonful of vanilla yogurt into his mouth. Mom gave him this dramatic sigh and ruffled up his already messed up hair just a little more. And this was their dynamic. Jeanne Levesque was no doubt Kai’s mother before his friend, but she always made sure to be the kind of mother that actually cared enough to also be Kai’s best friend. 

“Well, then I’ll come meet your new friends’ parents on Saturday. Now, I gotta head to work. You better be in bed before I get home, you have school in the morning. Get your homework done, take a shower, don’t sleep in the binder. Any other reminders I need to give?” Another forehead kiss and a quick squeeze of his arm. It was the little things she did that made Kai so grateful for such a great mom. 

“Nope! I think that’s all, Mama.” He always had said Mama with a French accent to it, one of the things she had taught him from the time he was waddling around in diapers. She was proud to be Frenchwoman, and she taught that pride to her child from the day he was old enough to understand. He didn’t speak the language, just basic conversation stuff. But he knew his culture and where his family hailed from, and isn't that what matters most? 

“Alright, well, I’m off. We have a mother-son night Friday. You better not be late, My popcorn waits for no one, mister.” She gave him a stern point as she grabbed onto the door handle, giving him a playful glare. He chuckled and nodded. “I know, I’ll grab some sodas on my way home from school.” 

“Bye, Kai. I love you so much.” 

“I love you too, Mom. See you later.” And she was gone. Sometimes Kai wished his mom was home more. She worked most nights, and always had to fit Kai into her schedule just so they could afford living. It sucked even more that she wouldn’t let Kai help her pay bills no matter how much he begged her. Kai supposed that’s just how it had to be for now, didn’t mean it didn’t suck any less though. 

He sat down on the full size mattress him and Mom shared, it was the only bed that fit in the apartment. He heard his little spiky friend digging around in her cage, so he went over to let her out and give her some attention. Kai worked his ass off to get his hedgehog, and he loved her more than life itself. He watched as her little nose started sniffing around for the smell of his sweater as soon as he was raising her out of the cage. He tucked her against his chest and sat back on the couch. 

“Good evening, Clara. How are you doing?” He held her up to his face, watching her little nose twitch and let her pressit against his own. He grinned, snickering and tucking her in the crook of her neck, letting her route around and make herself cozy. Kai hadn’t gotten her out to play in a couple days because of his own lack of time management skills. He felt really bad about it too. Of course he always made sure she was taken care of and had what she needed, but there was a difference between taking care of her and loving her. 

Kai laid back on the bed and let Clara make herself comfortable on his chest. Soon, their old man of a dog, Fritz, hopped up onto the bed and made himself cozy against Kai’s knees. Fritz was nearly fourteen at this point, an old and slightly crippled mutt colored like a Jack Russell. They were the two pets of the Levesque household, Fritz and Clara. Kai would kill a man for either one of them. He pondered upon that statement as he pulled out his notebooks to knock out his few homework assignments. 

* * *

“Paeden! Give me back my controller, you piece of shit!” Grant cussed, reaching over the couch to pin down his now twelve-year-old brother to get his damn Xbox controller back. Paeden snorted and held it just out of his reach, that cocky gap-toothed smirk on his face as he dropped the controller onto the ground with a thud. “God, you little asshole! I could put you back in the UFC, ya know!” Grant climbed off him and picked up the remote, shooting a glare at Paeden, who stuck his tongue out and leaned back on the couch. 

“Good, do it. I miss the fights.” The little brat draped himself over the arm of the couch dramatically, which he usually did. Letting his head hang upside down toward the floor so the blood rushed to his head. 

“You just miss getting your ass beat.” Grant corrected, restarting his game and continuing the level where he left off, snorting when Paeden gave him a half-hearted “Eh, maybe.” And that’s how they worked. Paeden was still a strange addition to the Wilson family, but they had a steady rhythm to life and it worked that way. 

The basement, more commonly called “The Vibe Spot” was comfortably quiet besides the noise of the TV as Grant played his video games for around twenty minutes. Paeden watched him play on the Xbox, occasionally throwing in pointers which Grant promptly ignored. He didn’t need Paeden Bennet telling him how to play games. Stupid little brothers, always getting on his nerves. 

Grant finds himself thinking about Kai. He always knew Kai was rather shy when it came to social interactions, he thinks the guy mentioned having some pretty bad anxiety offhandedly one time. But, Grant is very bad at remembering specifics about people. Unless that people was Paeden fucking Bennett, because as big brother it was his job to gain a scrapbook of complete blackmail on the kid. He wonders what Kai’s life is like behind the screen, behind the few things he had been told. He knew he had a single mom, and that his dad had been out of the picture pretty much his entire life, but that was about it. He thought of the random facts about Kai he knew from their years of playing DnD together. The traumatic experiences they had told each other. But… Grant couldn’t think of Kai’s favorite colour. Funny, how the world worked like that. He could tell you Kai’s grandfather had sent him death threats for a solid three months after he came out, but he couldn’t tell you what Kai’s favorite kind of soda was. Internet friends tended to go that way. 

He wondered what exactly Momma Levesque was like. Grant knew her in passing, she seemed like a sweet lady. Kai could go on whole tangents of how fantastic his mom was sometimes. Like how Nick used to be with Glenn back in elementary school, pre-shared traumatic experience. Grant enjoyed listening to Kai go on tangents, no matter what they were about. Sometimes Kai would info dump on Homestuck stuff that Grant really didn’t understand but would sit and listen to, or ramble about the new DnD podcast he was listening to while he played zen games. 

Grant has started podcasts just so he could talk to Kai about them. None with too much backlog, but ones like Fantasy High and BomBARDed. He enjoyed them, but he enjoyed even more how excited Kai would get when he’d tell him he checked it out and start rambling on which member and character is his favorite. All the little interests Kai had is what really got Grant. While Grant only got into video games, and kept his fandom contained in that, Kai had a running list of fandoms. 

“Why are you thinking so hard?” Paeden was a mere inch or two from Grant’s face by the time he zoned back into this plane of existence, and if that wasn’t a jumpscare Grant doesn’t know what is. He shrieked and shoved Paeden off him and into the floor. 

“Don’t get that close to me, holy fuck!” He blurted, yelling loud enough for Darryl to holler a scold for swearing at Paeden, which got more and more strange the longer it went on. Grant distinctly remembers Paeden having the worst potty mouth in Faerun and  _ he  _ never got scolded for swearing. Grant is old enough to drive a car, but Darryl won’t let him say fuck or god damn. Parents are bonkers. 

Paeden hopped back to his feet and brushed off his pants. “Whatever, grandson. I could see your brain gears smoking from the effort of actually being used.” He did a spin on his heels and fell back into the couch cushions. It was a strange understanding that Paeden will never let Darryl and Grant forget that he was, indeed, Frank Wilson at one point in life. Even if he wasn’t necessarily Frank anymore. 

“Pssh, whatever, Paeden. Why don’t you go play in the dirt or whatever it is brats do.” Grant waved Paeden off, pulling out his phone to scroll through the Tumblr posts he had missed in his hours at school and playing video games. One missed text message that was a username Grant actually cared about in his notifications. 

**Agni Kai:** Yoooooo, what time am I supposed to be there Saturday??? Also I’ll need an address prolly,,,, n mama wants to come along. 

Oh god. Grant’s heart explodes everytime Kai sends those awkward text messages where he’s asking a question but he’s scared of coming off as pushy or interrogating. 

**wish_granted:** Sometime around three is fine. 

**[you sent Agni Kai a location]**

**Agni Kai:** dope, dope. You wanna log on minecraft tonight? Or are you swamped? 

Honestly, Grant should not log into the Minecraft server with Kai tonight, he has so much homework to do and he needs to work on fixing his room up. But, he also can’t say no to Kai when he asks about playing games together, so of course he says he’ll log on after dinner. 

* * *

“Mama- MAMA! You’re fine. Grant says the parents are just as much a hodge-podge of people as the friend group, just… Talk about whatever it is parents talk about.” Kai encouraged, as he climbed out of his car and shut the door. They had had to park down the street from Grant’s house, but that wasn’t a big deal to either party. His mom was currently worried the other parents would dislike her, as she usually didn’t fit into parent friend groups very well. She always did that, convinced herself a situation was gonna turn rotten before she even engaged in it. 

“Who’s to say these parents aren’t like- super religious or something? Worse, what if they’re conservatives?” She had a hint of humor in her voice, then snickered and nudged Kai in the arm as she grabbed the small tupperware of cookies from the backseat. ‘

“Well, I know they aren’t conservatives. The only member of that friend group I’m not one-hundo percent sure is gay is TJ, and he’s on thin fucking ice. The twins haven’t confirmed anything, but if Lark Oak is cishet, I’m leaving. I gotta move to New York and change my name to another generic trans guy name. What do you think I should go with? Alex? Cameron?” He stuffed his hands into the pockets of his awesome jeans that he had discovered at Goodwill. They were just light wash jeans fashionably distressed with patches of busily-patterned black and white fabrics of various kinds, but Kai adored them. They were his new favorite article of clothing. They went perfectly with his Tavros t-shirt. 

They reached the front steps and Mom rang the doorbell, snatching Kai’s beanie off his head as soon as the door opened. 

“Ma!” His voice cracked and he snatched the hat back as soon as she took it, sitting it back on his head in the way he liked. The father standing in the doorway chuckled and stepped aside to let them in. 

“I’m gonna assume you’re Kai and…?” He trailed off realizing he didn’t quite know the name of Kai’s mother. He was a stocky man, mid to late forties. He wore a ball cap and had a fuzzy beard, your standard white suburban dad character. 

“Jeanne.” Mom supplied, shaking his hand politely. 

“Darryl Wilson, nice to meet you both. Mostly everyone’s out in the backyard.” He explained wordlessly taking the tupperware from Mom and gestured vaguely to the back door. “Make yourselves at home, I’m sorry in advance for anything my youngest does.” He disappeared into the kitchen and now Kai and his mom were left to navigate. 

They made their way to the backyard as instructed and were met with complete and utter chaos. 

On the couch sat a remarkably tall dark-skinned woman with a comically short and pale man in comparison laying against her side. She had a glass of wine and her legs crossed as she talked with the small man on her side, who was happily petting a light greyhound that was sitting at his feet. He could see Nick lounging on a float in the pool, looking like he was taking a fat nap before Lark completely flipped the thing and knocked him in the water. Grant was sitting on the edge of the pool, talking with TJ. Sparrow was furiously refilling one of those cheap foam water blasters you got at the dollar store to shoot at some random ginger kid Kai didn’t recognize. He could see two of the other dads standing in the yard chatting, a third awkwardly standing near the shorter of the two. It was a strange pair, if Kai was being honest. An obvious hippy nature dad and who he could only assume to be the infamous “Glennjamin Close” Nick spoke so highly of. He had no idea who this fifth father figure could be, however. He figured the hippy was Lark and Sparrow’s dad, from the similar build and unusually sharp ears. 

“OH SHIT, KAI’S HERE!” Nick yelled as they recovered from being promptly dumped into the water. Grant ushered Kai over to him and their spot on the side of the pool as the yelling of the tween boy and Sparrow faded into background noise. Kai looked up at his mom for a second, she seemed a bit overwhelmed with all the new people in the domain, the unfamiliar terrain and the unfamiliar faces. His mom always had a small problem when it came to social interactions, between the social anxiety and ADHD she really had trouble meeting people. He gave her a gentle nudge in the general direction of the other adults. He knew Glenn was fairly close to her age, and if he could fit into this crowd being at least ten-years younger than the majority of the other parents so could she. 

“Go.” He muttered to her, watching her give him a small nod before shoving him playfully toward his group of friends. 

Kai sat down on the edge of the pool, sandwiching Grant between TJ and himself. The water was warm, he noted as he put his feet in. It wasn’t a ‘someone just peed’ kind of warm, but it was still a comfortable temperature. He swished his feet around in the water for a minute. It honestly baffled him how people just  _ had backyard pools  _ in California. In Kentucky, having a backyard pool was something only the richest of rich people got. In California? It still wasn’t an ‘everyone had a pool’ kind of thing, but it was fairly common in higher-end neighborhoods. One of the many things about California that his little southern Kentucky boy heart was gonna take some getting used to. 

“That your mom?” Grant asked, watching her curiously. Kai looked over at her, watching that very tall lady stand up and what Kai would call adopting his mom as her new friend. Good. That’s good. His mom was very bad at initiating conversations. 

TJ pointed over at the woman, “That’s my mom, Samantha. And my stepdad, Ron, is the short guy.” He informed. 

“Well, now I see where you get the height.” Kai mumbled, addressing the fact TJ was 6’3 and absolutely dwarfed Kai’s 5' 5. “But, yeah, that’s my mom. She’s very awkward.” Kai watched his mom with a sort of protectiveness, making sure she didn’t look too uncomfortable as she sat and made small talk with Mrs. Samantha. 

Jeanne found herself sitting on the couch amongst the rest of the parents by the time two hours had passed. She had put together Ron and Samantha were married, and the eight year old little girl that was running the backyard and climbing trees was the child they had just adopted last year, Cynthia, along with the very tall boy who was currently in a water war with Kai was named Terry Junior and was Samantha’s son. She also put together Darryl was Henry’s boyfriend, and Mercedes was Henry’s wife. But Darryl and Mercedes were not interested in each other. Neato. She had also pieced together they were the parents of the two disaster twins that she had heard yelling in some poor amalgamation of languages. Darryl was (obviously) Grant’s father, and the twelve-year-old was his youngest he had apologized in advance for. 

Which left Glenn and Robin. Glenn was Nick’s father, and Nick was the ambiguous child that the parents were still learning to navigate the gender of. She had settled on just calling Nick a they for now, until she could ask Kai about the specifics of that whole situation. 

Currently, Darryl was sitting with one arm around the back of Henry’s shoulders resting on the couch and the other holding a beer. The fact this absolute stereotype of a man  _ wasn’t straight _ was a very strange discovery for Jeanne, at least before she spoke to him for more than five minutes. 

“So, Jeanne, what brings you and Kai to California? You both were in Kentucky before, right?” Darryl leaned forward to set his drink on the coffee table. He looked over his shoulder like some dad instinct kicked in, “PAEDEN! Where’d you get that? Bring me that!” The middle schooler gave the absolute most dramatic groan known to man. Darryl turned back around and held his hand out behind his hand, taking the- oh, that’s a knife. That is an entire knife. Where did a twelve year old get a knife? 

Darryl looked at the knife with mild disinterest, listening as Paeden started complaining.

“Come oooon, Darryl! Just one time? Like, at least me throw it at a tree or something. You can’t do this! I am your father!” Darryl set the knife down on the table and glanced over his shoulder to his son. 

“Mhm, okay Paeden. You go play, and we’ll discuss you getting a knife once I die.” He gave the boy a friendly pat on the shoulder and sent him off. It seemed like Paeden managing to steal knives and trying to do cool tricks with them was a normal occurrence in the Wilson household. “Sorry, Jeanne. He does this. Say whatever it was you were going to.” Henry prompted, leaning a little further into Darryl. Jeanne knew this whole group was one that had stood sturdy for a while now, and her and Kai were entering uncharted territory. A lioness and her cub entering a pride that’s not theirs. 

“Oh well.. Um, do you want the reason I tell Kai we moved or the actual reason? Cause, those are two different answers.” She sighed, bouncing her leg as the greyhound came up to her and laid his head in her lap. Jeanne knew the cute dog’s name was Bigly, and he was Grant’s ESA. Though, that made her wonder why Grant would need an ESA, but each family goes through things. She knows her and Kai had when he was just a little baby. 

“Whichever version you’re comfortable sharing with us.” Was Henry’s reply. 

“Well, in full honesty, Kai and I had to run. My ex is batshit crazy and, for as long as Kai can remember we’ve been hiding from him. He doesn’t know that we’re hiding from him, but we are. But, six months ago, he managed to track Kai down through school records and by extension, me. So, I either risked, probably, getting Kai and I murdered, or I could get the hell out of dodge.” Jeanne thinks this is the first time she’s ever really told anyone the whole situation with her and her son. Hell, Kai didn’t even know about his dad or any of the shit that went down in the Levesque household before Kai was old enough to remember. “Kai doesn’t know any of that though, and he won’t know any of it. I don’t…” How does she phrase it? It’s not that she doesn’t want Kai to know, but she knows Kai is a worrier and overthinks, and knows he’ll keep himself up at night fearing the worst. “I don’t want him to feel afraid.” She got a nod from Henry, and Glenn spoke up first. 

“I can relate to that, a little bit. My dad wasn’t necessarily the worst kind of person, but, soon as I was old enough I got myself emancipated and disappeared off his map. Haven’t seen the old bastard in close to twenty-five years.” He propped his feet up on the coffee table, leaning back like he didn’t care about death. 

As usual, the kids claimed attention once more when the panicked shrieks of Kai filled the air. Jeanne’s instincts kicked in hard and she doesn’t think she’s ever turned around so fast. Luckily, though, her boy was just being hoisted over Nick’s shoulder. 

“Nick! Nick, I swear to the holy mother of god, if you dump me in the pool! Nick! NICK! Nick this is fresh dye, man!” He squealed, kicking his legs dramatically and banging on Nick’s back to be set down. Jeanne snickered and watched the scene play out. 

“Shush it, babe. You are gonna get in the pool. Water time, baby!” 

“NICK! NICKIE, NO!” Aaaaaaaand SPLASH! Into the pool Kai Levesque went, the rest of the guys hopping in afterward to chaos all out chaos in the water. Samantha chuckled and sipped on her wine, “Boys will be devious little shits to each other.” She murmured, causing a ripple of laughter through the rest of the parents. 


	3. the one where they commit a crime

Kai found himself sitting in a couch float with Nick and TJ piled on either side of him as they floated aimlessly around in the pool. Grant had his arms crossed and used Kai’s thighs as an armrest to guide them around as he walked. The couch, sadly, couldn’t fit all four of them. 

“YES! POWER! BOW TO YOUR OVERLORD, GLENN!” lark shouted, in victory as he beat Glenn yet again in a game of Ninja. Apparently it was an old tradition the twins and Glenn would play Ninja at any gathering, as Nick had informed Kai earlier in the evening. 

“Aight, aight, boys. Time for a friendly Nick Close round of Let’s Get Personal!” Nick grinned, taking another bite of his cookie (that he informed Kai is indeed an edible). He laid his arm across the back of the couch, using his foot to splash Grant in the face with a sizable amount of water. Grant sputtered for a moment, glaring at Nick. He couldn't take too much retaliation without getting Kai and TJ caught in the crossfire, however. 

“Sounds dope. Explain Let’s Get Personal to Kai, though. I don’t think he’s played before.” TJ chimed in, swishing his legs in the water. His head was laid back and watching the sky, his dark brown eyes darting between the clouds. He looked over at Kai and squinted for a moment. Kai gave a nervous smile. Why was he staring at him like that? 

TJ mumbled an ‘interesting’ and turned back to the clouds. Apparently Kai’s discomfort with that whole interaction was painstakingly obvious because Nick burst out laughing harder than he should have and Grant chuckled. 

“TJ was studying you, ignore him.” That did not make Kai feel any better, but he settled into the squeaky plastic of the inflatable pool couch and turned back to Nick. 

“So, what’s this game?” 

“This lovely game is a Nick Close original game, my good sir. Let’s Get Personal is a brilliant game where we give you a year or an age, or some other kind of vague prompt, you tell the first memory or thought that comes to mind. It’s all about oversharing, so don’t be afraid to get reeeeal personal. It’s all in the game. See, watch, Grant and I will go first. Grant, 2019.” 

“Yeet Bigly and Henry turning into a Wombat.” 

“2010” 

“Oh! Jackie pinning me on the ground and spitting in my face as punishment ‘cause I was being a little shit and broke her stuff.” 

“Middle school.” 

“Getting outed to Dad aaand Mom moving out.” 

“And that’s the game, Kai.” 

“This sounds… Very distressing.” Kai brushed his bangs out his eyes, not missing how Grant’s cheeks flushed a bit and he quickly began looking at Nick instead of Kai. Still? Damn, Grant Wilson. 

_Kai twelve again, logging into the Discord voice chat and hearing his closest friend of Grant talking to one of their old friends, Jax._

_“Jax- Jax no. Like, I know [Kai] isn’t- yeah, but [he]’s just so pretty, man. I’m pretty sure I have a crush on [him].”_

_“You gonna tell [him]?”_

_“Heck no! I don’t wanna ruin our friendship. [He]’s like- like my best friend! Besides Nick, [Kai]’s all I got in the field of friends. I don’t wanna ruin that.”_

_“Hey, guys. What’re we playing?” Kai decided to chime in by that point. He felt too awkward sitting in silence as he heard a conversation definitely not meant for his ears._

_“Oh shit! Sup, [Kai], when’d you log on?” Jax had a slight snicker to his voice._

_“Said hi as soon as I entered. Why?” He didn’t want to admit that he had just heard what they were talking about, didn’t want to cause that discomfort in the friend group by admitting he knew. He could tell Grant seemed at ease thinking he hadn’t heard._

Kai made a mental note to ask Nick about Grant’s former-crush with the “Name that shall not be named,” maybe he could give him more information on if Kai was reading too much into things or if Grant really was still in love with him. It had been four years, surely he had gotten over the petty middle school crush by now? But… Then again, this was Grant Wilson. Grant Wilson who kept tabs on his friends at all hours, had secret lists of their tells of what meant they were feeling sad. Grant Wilson who heard his dad say a mildly homophobic joke one time in fifth grade and was terrified to come out for the next six years because he was convinced his dad ould kick him out and disown him. Grant Wilson who internalizes every single emotion and lets it fester for years and years and never addresses any of his feelings or moves on from them. 

Yeah, okay. Maybe Grant was still crushing on Kai. But, how did he address that now? It’s been four years, does Grant even remember that conversation? Did he even care anymore? So many thoughts raced through Kai’s head that he wasn’t sure which ones were important at this second. 

“Terry! We gotta head out, bud!” He heard Mrs. Samantha yell from the deck, holding a very tired looking eight year old who was practically asleep on her shoulder. Terry sighed and pushed himself out of his spot on the couch and hopped out of the pool. 

“Bye, guys. I’ll see you all… Monday? Or are we doing something tomorrow?” He asked, pulling off his shirt to ring it out cause, of course he was now soaking wet. Kai noticed TJ had larger scars than what should normally be on a sixteen year old- or anyone for that matter. It was concerning. Now that he thought about it, Grant had a few scars like that. Specifically on his back. It looked like a set of claws had just ripped into him at one point. Kai wondered quietly what had happened. He supposed there could've been a car accident or something, but Kai won’t know for sure unless he asks, and he certainly isn’t prodding at that wound quite yet. 

As soon as TJ’s gone, Grant’s wiggling his way into the couch. On the first try, his hands slip and he goes under. Nick holds him down for a second with his foot just to be mean. Grant comes back up with a mischievous grin, and drags Nick right out of his spot on the float and into the water. In Nick’s scramble from just being so cruelly plucked off his cozy spot, Grant hopped up onto the crouch and slung his legs across Kai’s lap, leaning back with a smug grin at Nick. 

“G-man, I will sit on you. Right now. Make room. Move.” Nick demanded, nudging Grant to move. Grant, of course, did not move. Two (maybe three, as calateral) can play at this game. “Aight, in you go.” Nick sighed, flipping the float and sending the two screeching boys into the water. He heard the chuckles from the parents. 

“That’s my boy!” Glenn laughed, giving Nick a cheerful round of applause for his savage dump of his mates into the water. 

Nick tipped the couch to face upwards again, hopping in and taking up as much of the couch as possible. The stoner kid was just like that, anry and petty in ways Kai may never understand. Grant didn’t flinch, climbing back in and sitting on top of Nick, who grunted and shifted. 

“Ay! Wilson! Get your ass off of me!” Nick huffed, laughing as he said it, Grant covered Nick’s mouth with his hand and ignored him. “So, Kai- WOAH!” Back in the water Grant went as Nick shifted to sit normally. Before either boy in the water could make a move to also get back in their seats on the couch float, Lark and Sparrow had made their way into sandwiching Nick between the chaos. 

Kai hadn’t really interacted with the Oak twins yet, if he’s being completely honest. They seemed off in their own dimension more often than not, only tuning into this plane of reality once in a while to tell their friends about something cool. They could communicate with just a few looks. They were definitely easy to tell apart after Kai had known them for about a week. Lark was the one who talked literally nonstop, at first he didn’t think Lark knew how shut up. He comes up with crazy schemes and would probably have committed arson by now if Henry didn’t let him have bonfires whenever he asked. Sparrow evened his brother out. He was more calculated in his chaos. He wouldn’t just cause outright mayhem. He was conniving in a way that downright scared Kai. He was fourteen, and TJ had told Kai in detail the story about how when they found out some kids were bullying Paeden, Sparrow systematically ruined their life by manipulation and internet hacking. Sparrow didn’t talk much, unless it was about his newest trolling endeavors online or maintaining Lark’s sanity, but he didn’t need to for Kai to know he would not hesitate to commit murder is the reasons met his standards. From the way the rest of the group talks, and some off handed jokes Kai won’t let himself read too far into; he has. 

“Okay, okay, okay, okay, Nickie, NICKIE!” Lark started, gesturing wildly as he spoke, barely able to put his thoughts together long enough to form a sentence. 

“Yeah, Lark, I’m listening.” 

“You, me, Sparrow, Newbie, The Spot, tonight. Eleven o’clock.” He flapped his hands in excitement, bouncing on the float. Nick smirked at him and patted his curls. 

“First, Birdie, stop bouncing like that, you’ll pop the float. And two, that’s between Kai and his momma if he comes to the spot with us.” Lark stuck out his bottom lip and looked at Kai, 

“You’re coming with us.” It was not a question, it was a command. A command that sent a shiver down Kai’s spine. 

“I-I have to ask Mama, I usually have a ten o’clock curfew so-” Sparrow turned and looked him dead in the eyes, Kai backed up into Grant, who grabbed his arms to steady him as he stumbled. These two were terrifying. “I don’t think you heard my brother, Kai Levesque. You’re coming with us.” An uncomfortable silence fell over the entire backyard, he could see his mom stand up from the crowd to see what the actual hell was happening. 

Kai must’ve looked as scared as he felt, because Nick snorted and smacked Sparrow in the arm. “Cut it out, Spearow. He’s fucking with you, Kai, you’re fine. They do this.” Nick tugged Sparrow’s ear, making him sit back. Both twins lit up with giggles, speaking back and forth in what Kai had learned they called Elvish. Grant gave his forearms a gentle squeeze to reassure him. “Sorry Kai, the twins do that. They like scaring people. But, yeah. You need to be initiated into the Doodlers, so you gotta come out with us tonight.” He explained, going to sit on the edge of the pool and hold the couch float near him with his foot. Kai hopped up next to him, laying his head on his shoulder and swinging his legs contentedly. 

* * *

Grant Wilskn wasn’t the one who decided they should use adding Kai to the mural as sort of initiation. Grant Wilson thought that made The Doodlers seem like a cult. And Grant Wilson was definitely not consenting to this plan now, as the group of boys walked to the old abandoned skatepark down by the park. The whole place was riddled with graffiti, and hadn’t been used in as long as Grant’s lived in the area. They would’ve driven, Nick had his intermediate (even if he wasn’t supposed to drive with more than one non-family member in the car, he always drove the gang around anyway), but Robin shut that plan down when he realized Nick had in fact eaten one of Glenn’s edibles. So, now the group of five were walking in the dark to their favorite hang out spot in the abandoned skate park that hadn't been used in as long as Grant could remember. 

"Why didn't you bring Bigly?" Lark asked, playing with the slime he'd had carried around for as long as Grant had known the walking disaster.

“Didn't want to deal with him.” Grant sighed, looking over the streetlamps, watching from the corner of his eye as Nick slid by on his skateboard, Kai following not far behind. Usually, Grant would be the one skating with Nick, but Kai had lost his board during the chaos of the move and Grant was a bit of sucker for his friends, so he let Kai take his board so he could screw around for the evening. He thinks he could hear them chatting back and forth as they sped ahead of the rest of the friend group, but he had no idea. 

“So, Kyle, how are we adjusting to the beauty that is San Dimas? You love it yet?” Nick asked, slowing down his speed to match Kai’s. Kai was a less experienced compared to Nick’s years of skating and doing dumb tricks that didn’t work right, but it worked for the both of them quite well. 

“Well, firstly, my full name is not Kyle. Just Kai. But, I dunno yet. It’s very different from Kentucky. Like, a good different. Still, it’s not what I’m used to and it takes some adjusting to get cozy. I’m glad I found you guys, though.” 

“Kai, you’re new, so you probably don’t know this fact about dear old Nicholas Close, everyone has a little nickname. My dad? Glennjamin. Grant? G-man. Lark? Birdie. Sparrow? Spearow. TJ? Teej. So, you’re now Kyle. Sorry, I don’t make the rules- no wait, I literally made that rule. Nevermind.” He snickered and skidded to a stop, kicking his board up into his hand effortlessly. Kai stopped to, but had to chase his own board for a second to grab it off the street. He was still learning, cut him some slack.

“Literally, anything but Kyle is fair game.” Kai had a mild groan to his voice, following Nick as he slipped under the caution tape leading into what seemed to be an abandoned park. Kai really had no idea where he was going, but he knew Grant wouldn’t take him somewhere he wouldn’t be comfortable with, and as chaotic as the twins were they didn’t cause trouble without good reason. Nick Close and his craving for mischief was still up in the air, but that didn't really bother Kai.

As Kai walked through the overgrown brush behind Nick, he pulled his phone out and turned on the flashlight for his own security knowing he wasn’t gonna bust his nose over a tree root or something similar. He could see them coming up on a clearing in the grass for an old, spray-painted to a tee skatepark that clearly had only been used in the eighties. There was a murale on the wall made by the half-pipe, and Nick seemed to be b-lining for it. 

“Wha-a-a-a-at are we doing?” Kai asked, following Nick up to the large murale. The centerpiece looked like a mesh of lines and scribbles that vaguely resembled a creature, said creature was kicking a soccer ball. Above it read “The Doodlers” in bold red letters, centered below was “Faerun” and a date. He could see each of the boys’ names on the wall, with a list of things under each. 

“Making you an official Doodler. This is our banner. Lark and I painted this impulsively in sixth grade, and then we all added our names and some events we know affected us as people. Kind of like... Wrote the titles of the chapters of our lives.” Nick explained, taking Kai’s make-shift flashlight to focus on his own name. _Nicholas Close. Car-wreck. Dye. Tour. Battle Axe._ It was set up like a grocery list, almost. _Lark Oak. Tryouts. Pyramid. Oakvale. Grant Wilson. Yeet. Chimera. Outed. Jax_. Jax. That name echoed in Kai’s head like a bad melody he had heard on the radio. It had almost been a year now, but some days it still felt like yesterday all the chaos of that had happened. He himself went back into reading the rest of the murals before he got too caught up in those memories and made himself cry. 

Kai pondered over what all the different words meant for each boy. Maybe he could ask about a couple while they’re all down here tonight. It seemed like personal things though. He was also plotting what events in his life he constituted as a ‘chapter’ of life. He could hear the twins and Grant following up behind them.

“And now we wait for Teej.” Grant muttered, coming up next to Kai and staring at the mural. “You know what that disaster of lines is?” He snorted, gesutringly vaguely to the figure in the mural. 

“Not a clue.” Kai shrugged, hooking his arm around Grant’s. It was a silent agreement they’d had since they first met in person a year ago that Kai would be the friend who initiates physical affection at all hours. “What is it, GG?” He asked, adjusting a little so Grant stood closer to him. 

“He’s our mascot, the Doodler. Lark made him, originally he was for the soccer team, but through events he’s become more of a staple of our friend group.” He helpfully supplied, reading over all the words himself. He turned to Lark and Sparrow who were pulling out a deck of Cards Against Humanity cards and What Do You Meme that Kai guessed they had snagged off the adults before they left. “Hey, Lord of Chaos, where's TJ? Is he coming?” Both looked at him, scarily in sync with each other. 

“Terry Junior shall be arriving any minute. He informed us he was having to put the child in bed.” Sparrow said, turning back to his cards and shuffling them for some entertainment. Kai wasn’t sure you were actually supposed to shuffle the Cards Against Humanity cards, but Sparrow was doing so anyways. 

A rustling sounded in the underbrush, a flashlight shining into their alcove. All five kids ducked under the wall in case it was some sort of security guard or police officer coming to check in on the noise in the old abandoned skate park. 

“Damn, y’all act like I’ve not been here since the beginning.” Terry Junior sighed, an amused lilt to his voice, as he came out of the overgrown and into the small concrete clearing. Nick hopped right back up and skittered over, throwing an arm across his shoulders and leaning what was essentially his entire body weight onto TJ. Kai stepped back to where he was pre-getting caught scare, taking Grant with him. The twins didn’t bother to move, they were still comfortably seated against the old Doodler wall. 

“Hey! Whatsup, Teej? Are you ready to help us initiate the newbie? Got the goods?” Nick rambled, brushing a few stray curls from TJ’s forehead. Grant pulled Nick off TJ’s shoulder, rolling his eyes with disinterest. 

“Your crush is showing Nick.” He teased, shoving Nick back toward the mural with the same playful and chill air Grant Wilson always had. Nick gasped, putting his hands over his chest as if he was offended. “How dare you accuse _me_ of being attracted to a- a” He mocked a gag, “A _man!_ We are strictly in love with beautiful women and one singular gamer boy in this house!” he got amused looks from both TJ and Grant at that. “Anyway, my love life is of no one's concern. We need to get this whole shindig over with, I got shit to do tomorrow.” 

“Oh, yeah. Here, I got the spray paint.” TJ quickly dug around in his bag for a bit, pulling out a new can of pale pink spray paint and tossing it to Kai. “There ya go. Also, I brought DnD stuff if we decide to do a quick session. But, it seems the twins wanna play Cards, so we can do that.” He shrugged, dropping the bag in the middle of the clearing and looking expectantly at Kai. 

“So- wait, what do I do?” Kai asked, looking at the spray paint and then to Grant, and then the wall. He had never been one to openly break rules like this, he had always been a good kid. Not that he was against breaking laws, he just never had the motivation to get into trouble before. Though, he guessed this wasn’t really getting into trouble by the traditional sense. Especially if this place really was abandoned like he believed it to be. 

“You just throw your name up on the wall and make a list of what you think were the biggest events in your life so far. You can tell us about them if you want, but you don’t have to. Like, the five of us pretty much know what everyone else's means cause we’ve been friends for nearly a decade now, but still. Like, I dunno what dye means on Nick’s.” He offered, stepping back to give Kai the space he needed to do his own portion of the mural. 

“Y’all have some nice symmetry going on, I dunno if I wanna mess it up.” Kai teased, hitting the spray can against the corner of the wall to pop off the cap. He thought about when he was twelve and him and his mom would paint random things on their small tool shed in the backyard. Those were the best memories. 

Kai looked at the open spot on the end of the wall, opposite from where Lark and Sparrow were entertaining themselves with a game of Cards Against Humanity. 

_Kai Levesque._ He stared at his name after he put it up on the wall, walking in reverse through his years on this earth to what he would constitute as a chapter. 

_Kai was just four years old, but he felt like he could take on the world… Usually. Right now was not one of those moments. Strange new grown-ups had come to talk to Mama. He did not enjoy strange new adults. He clutched onto her pant leg and hid as they chatted. Sure, there was a fence between Kai and the strange new grown-ups at their strange new home, but it was still very scary to Kai._

_The voices were all muddled and strange, not words Kai cared enough to remember at that moment. His mama picked him up and propped him on her hip. She grinned at him, the sun in her eyes making her squint all funny-like. Kai giggled, pulling a strand of her hair into his hands to mess with it. Mama had pretty hair. Mama kissed his head, he didn’t really understand why she seemed so emotional all of sudden while she held his head against hers for a moment._

_“It’s all good now, [Kai], we’re home.”_

_Home._ He had put the word up on the wall before he even really realised he was writing it. He thought about how even their new small apartment felt like a proper home, just because Mama was there. He looked over at Grant. Grant was a chapter all on his own. 

_Jax had sent Kai a text earlier in the day to join a new Discord server he had made with some friends he made on Amino earlier that month. Kai was a strictly Discord roleplay server and Instagram kinda guy, himself, but he wouldn’t tell Jax no. Apparently this server was mostly for just forming groups to play online games with and general chit-chat from what Kai had been told._

_**→pupa pan** just landed_

_**pupa pan:** hi, i guess? _

_**Jaxton has no rights:** hey, newbie. _

_**I want rights back :( :** hey, [Kai]! You actually joined, dope. **@Jaxton has no rights** is my friend Grant, I was telling you about him earlier. Right? _

_**pupa pan:** uhhh, yeah, i think. _

The next word Kai wrote up on the wall was a simple one, one Grant would probably understand. _Pupa._ As much as he hated looking back on his Homestuck days, Pupa was what he went by online for so many years, it was what Grant met him as. Hell, before he settled on Kai he even thought Pupa would be his name after he came out. He couldn’t deny Pupa was a chapter of his life he couldn’t avoid. He heard Grant snicker behind him, that cute laugh that he’d had since before Kai was around, “Pfft, okay Homestuck.” He blurted. Kai looked back at him to see him with his hands tucked into the pockets of his hoodie, a sense of nostalgia in his expression at seeing the name he had probably long forgotten. But, thinking about Pupa made his brain spiral into what made him drop that name and replace it with Kai. 

_Kai sat with Grant quietly after all the affairs and pleasantries were over. They had both driven up to North Dakota for this, Kai doesn’t think he would’ve missed it if his life depended on it. He just wished the first time he was meeting his best friend in person was under happier circumstances._

_They sat next to each other on the stone wall that encircled the cemetery, Grant staring blankly over the rows of headstones, his eyes avoiding the one Kai couldn’t look away from. They clutched each other's hands, keeping each other strong. Grant tightened his grip, letting out a mix of a whine and a sob. Before either realized it, they had each other in a hug. A silent promise to always be there for each other, to stick together. Even if the leader of their pack was gone._

_Kai let go, climbing off the wall. And looking back at Grant who looked completely dissociated, lost from reality now that he showed a moment's weakness._

_“I-I’m gonna go see the grave. You coming?” he gave Grant’s hand a gentle squeeze, not daring to move until he got a response. The slow, half there nod Grant gave as he slid off the wall. They walked hand in hand to the one location they’d both been avoiding for the past hour._

Kai took a deep unsteady breath. It’s hard to believe it’s already been a year since that surreal day. _Funeral_. His letters weren’t as neat on that one, but he was okay with that. 

And his final word, the chapter he’s still going through. He looked over at the kids who had decided overnight that he was their new addition only because he had played Minecraft with one of their buddies over the years. The fact that he can’t remember the last time he had friends who genuinely supported him. Hell, his old friends in Kentucky didn’t even use his preferred name and pronouns. 

Kai’s final word was a simple one; _Doodlers_. 


	4. the one where he learns his family history

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to put a quick warning for the final scene in this chapter; there's nothing super severe, but it is implied that Kai's mom was a domestic violence victim. The scene start's with Grant and Kai laying on a couch playing video games, so if that's a trigger for you please skip until the final two paragraphs or so.

“Okay, Grant. You know which pedals which, right?” This is how it was every time Grant was allowed to drive. Dad had to make sure  _ every time _ he got behind the wheel that Grant hadn’t magically forgotten everything he’d learned over the last year in the two days he’d gone without driving. 

“I know, Dad. I know.” Grant groaned, buckling in his seat belt and gripping his steering wheel tightly as he took a deep breath. Something about driving always made his nerves spike. He should probably think about that a little more, but in classic Wilson fashion, Grant refuses to ever admit his problems until he’s forced to. 

“Alright, kiddo. Well, go ahead and pull out whenever you’re ready.” Dad looked through the back window, making sure the street was clear for Grant to back up. 

“I know what I’m doing.” Grant muttered, putting the car in gear and slowly pulling out of the driveway. He’d done this a couple dozen times before, but it was still nerve racking. 

“Good job, kiddo.” He knew Dad was being sincere in the compliment, but it still felt forced as Grant straightened the car out in his lane and began his drive down the road. 

Grant was no seasoned driver, he’d barely been allowed on the open roads for six months (even if Dad had let him climb behind the wheel in empty parking lots and highways since he was fourteen). He always drove under the speed limit. Always. It was a Grant Wilson guarantee that you will go ten under the speed limit because any faster will scare the shit out of him. Dad had seemed to learn this fact very fast once Grant actually got out on the road and let him drive however he felt comfortable. Thank god. 

Of course as soon as Grant got on the road, his phone started ringing. He pulled the device out of the cup-holder and handed it to his father for further inspection, turning onto the main road as cautiously as humanly possible. 

“It says uh…” He could see his dad squint in confusion at the contact name. A Doodler, got it. “Pupa Pan? Who’s that?” 

“It’s Kai. Click accept.” 

“Yeah how do I-”

“Tap the green telephone.” Grant sighed. Dad never would get a smartphone. He still had some shitty Nokia and Grant had to give him a crash course every time he needed to use Grant’s phone for something. 

Kai’s voice came through the speakers. He sounded like a whole other person on the phone than he did in real life. After only hearing him online for five years, it was a welcomed familiarity to hear that slightly distorted voice as opposed to his real, non-virtual one. 

“GG! You picked up, awesome! Okay, I’ve gone into a panic mode and I-” He was speaking fast, faster than usual. Okay, Kai’s stressed. Analyze, Grant. What has Kai told you in the past week that could stress him out? Grant also had to keep in mind Dad was in the car and could hear everything he was saying. He started racking his brain through every conversation, every word Kai had spoken. Maybe problems with Alyssa? He knew she was one of his old Kentucky friends, and that she did not take him coming out very well, nor did she seem thrilled he was moving. 

“Okay, Kai. One, breathe. Two, I’m in the car, and you’re on speaker. So, be that as it may. Now, what’s happening?” 

“Mama texted, and I quote, ‘We need to talk.’ At 3:22 and she gets off work at four, so now we play Watch Kai Have a Meltdown Until Mom Gets Home.” 

“Oh fuck. Kai Heloise Levesque, what did you do to make your mom send a ‘we need to talk’ text. She knows your queer, right?” Grant could see the confusion on Dad’s face. Clearly Dad had never experienced the existential terror of your parental unit ominously sending you a text saying “we need to talk” while they were at work. 

“Yes she knows I’m queer! I told her before I told you, man. I dunno what I could’ve done to piss her off. Doodler mural, maybe. That may constitute a We Need To Talk. But that’s not  _ horrible.  _ I mean, at least I’m not being  _ too  _ illegal.” Kai sighed. Grant thinks he had sat down somewhere. He could also hear occasional whispers in Kai’s ‘baby voice,’ which meant Kai was cuddling with Clara for emotional support. 

“Nah, no way. All the dads know we vandalized that old place and none of them care. Henry said, and I quote, ‘So long as the cops don’t catch you, and Lark isn’t painting on my walls, I don’t care.’ So, we’re safe on that front.” 

“Discord, maybe?” 

“She’s always been chill with Discord! You’re overthinking.” 

“Fuck. Fuck- Mom’s pulling up. I  _ will _ call you back if I survive. If not, I leave my hedgehog to TJ. He’s the only one I trust to take care of her.” It was somewhat a joke, and somewhat true. Ms. Levesque angry was not a Ms. Levesque Grant ever wanted to see. He’d heard her mildly annoyed and stressed through video calls and voice chats over the years, but never downright  _ mad.  _ That seemed like a death sentence to piss of Ms. Levesque

Grant hung up the phone, letting the sounds of his playlist filter back into the radio. Lots of Beach Bunny and The Front Bottoms, which really did describe Grant’s whole vibe as a human being, if he’s being totally honest with himself. 

“What was that about?” Dad asked, slumping back in his seat and watching out the window. He seemed to vibe with the tone of Grant’s playlist, which was a bit comical from how Dad insisted he only enjoyed 90’s music. 

“Do you really not understand the absolute terror that comes with texting ‘We need to talk’ to me?” Grant was baffled, befuddled, some other word indicating confusion that starts with a B. Dad looked at him with this confused look, clearly he did not understand the kind of existential terror a teenager felt when he would send those texts. “Dad, whenever you say that, it's like, you just told me indirectly that I’m in big league trouble.” Dad did not seem amused by that statement, strangely enough. 

“Why would you think I was upset with you unless you were doing stuff you weren’t supposed to, Grant?” He had an amused tilt to his voice, like he just caught Grant red-handed getting into trouble. 

“Because you’re unpredictable sometimes, Dad, not gonna lie to you.” Was the best explanation he could come up with. Because, while Grant was no angel child, he wasn’t about to tell his dad he’s gotten much higher than he should with Nick on multiple occasions, or that he has been black out drunk once before (under Connor’s supervision, but still). Some stories your dad shouldn't know. 

Another phone ringing broke that conversation where it stood. He heard Dad grumble something before picking up. This time it wasn’t connected to the speakers so Grant had no idea what conversation was actually transpiring. It’s strange how you never seem to get calls until you’re in the car, honestly. He sat in quiet, listening to small directions of his father as they drove down the road to pick up his older brother from the airport. Grant had never felt real attached to Daniel, the man was moving out when Grant was eight, so not many memories were to be had with Daniel. 

The one memory Grant could recall was one night his parents were out of town and Jackie and Daniel were watching Grant and there was a pretty bad thunderstorm going on. Jackie was already asleep, but Daniel was sitting at the TV watching some movie. Grant thinks he was maybe four? Five? However old, Daniel was a teenager at the time. 

He was holding his blanket and standing in the doorway watching the movie over the back of the couch, more like watching the back of Daniel’s head, really. Another loud clap of thunder scared him and he screamed. 

“Grant?” Daniel called into the darkness, sitting up straighter and turning to look over the back of the couch. Little feet pattered as Grant ran over and climbed onto the couch and into Daniel’s lap. “Did the storm scare you? Dang, come here, bud.” Daniel wrapped the small blanket around Grant and let him curl up in his lap. Daniel switched off whatever teenage movie on Netflix he was watching, and switched over to some kids cartoon that was light-hearted and would help Grant feel more secure. He also remembers being carried to bed when he was half-conscious about an hour later. 

Dad sighed as he hung up the phone, dropping it back in the cup-holder. So, either Paeden got in trouble at school or Lark got in trouble at school and Darryl had to handle the fallout. 

“We gotta go sort some things out with Paeden after we get Daniel, he got in another fight.” no

“You can take the orphan out of the UFC but-” 

“Please don’t finish that sentence, Grant.” Darryl sighed, turning up the music. Penelope Scott. Lovely. 

* * *

The lock in the door jingled as Jeanne Levesque came home. Kai felt the tension in his bones skyrocket as the door pushed open and his mom entered. She kicked off her shoes next to the door as always. Kai tried his best to act like he was totally fine, not looking up to her too eagerly and continuing to play on his Switch. He watched over the top of his console as she grabbed some lounge clothes out of the dresser and headed to the bathroom to change out of her uniform. Typical routine. Kai hated this. What was wrong? What did he do? What did they need to talk about? Kai can’t think of any particular trouble he’d gotten into since they moved, and anything he did back in Kentucky was beating a dead horse now. Right? 

Mama came back out, and sat on the bed next to where Kai was playing Animal Crossing. There was a harsh beat of silence where Kai could swear he could hear his moms heartbeat. He quickly saved his game and shut off the console. It was time to talk, he supposed.

“So um… What did you wanna talk about?” His voice cracked as he asked and as much as he tried, the fear still lingered in his voice. 

“First off, you are  _ not _ in trouble,” She was tapping her fingers on her collarbone, which Kai had learned over the years was a stress stim for her. Now Kai was even more anxious. God, he hated when his mom did this. She always put off talking to him about stuff. “But, um… It’s- it’s about your dad, Kai. He’s- he’s trying to take custody of you.” 

* * *

Daniel looked just as millennial hipster as Grant remembered him looking from when he’d seen him at Christmas. Long hair tied back in a man bun with a beard growing in and thick glasses frames. He wore just as typical hipster fashion, white shirt with a red flannel and rolled sleeves, as well as jeans and beaten up Vans. The back door opened and Daniel tossed his suitcase into the seat and toppled in after it. 

“Look at you, Grant! Being all adult and driving.” He teased, ruffling Grant’s hair. A good enough hug until they got back home. Grant promptly tuned out the conversation and focused on the sounds of Girl Tones coming through the speakers as he drove toward Paeden’s school. “So, Dad, what’d Paeden do this time?” Daniel inquired, leaning back in his spot in the middle row of seats. 

“Honestly, who knows at this point. Probably got into a fight, he tends to do that a lot.” Darryl sighed, still trying his best to direct Grant occasionally. But, Grant had this. He’d been driving six months. His hands still shook every time he grabbed the wheel, but that’s besides the point. 

Grant pulled into the old middle school and parked as close as he could find a spot. A little crooked, but good enough. He turned off the ignition and watched Dad take a deep breath before climbing out. 

“You boys stay in here, I’ll be right back. Hopefully he’s not suspended.” And Dad was gone, leaving a tense silence between the two brothers who had little to nothing in common. Daniel leaned up between the seats to be able to look at Grant, that infectious smile on his face. Daniel always did have a great smile. 

“So, Grant, you’re like- sixteen now, right? You got a boyfriend yet?” And, while Grant could go on a rant about how he didn’t need a man just because he was finally old enough to have one by Mom’s rules; he won’t. Because just asking that so casually felt like a million steps taken in the right direction with Daniel

Grant picked at his nails, thinking about how just five years ago he overheard Daniel telling dad how he didn’t really agree with gay marriage being legalized. How terrified Grant felt for years to come out to him until Dad burned a trailway with Henry. Yet, here Daniel was teasingly asking Grant if he had found a boyfriend yet. 

“Well- no. Not really. I mean, there’s this new guy in our group who I wouldn’t be  _ opposed _ to dating. But also, Nick. Like- yeah, Nick.” He shrugged and leaned his head back against the headrest. That really was all there was to say on it. Nick. 

“Okay- okay, forgive me if I’m wrong here. But, Nick is the one with the stepdad?” 

“Nick’s the punk kid who’s a pothead.” Grant corrected. Well, Daniel could be right by saying ‘the one with the stepdad’ but, he knew Daniel probably wasn’t talking about Robin with that statement. Did Daniel even know about Robin? Probably not. Grant didn't even know about Robin until last year. Glenn's really private with that kind of stuff.

“Right! The disaster with the rock-star dad.” Daniel snapped his fingers a couple times, adjusting his hips so he could lean on the console like some sort of movie therapist. “I need to tell you, Grant, if you date a pothead I will better not catch you becoming a stoner." He stared at Grant for a minute, like waiting for confirmation Grant wasn't gonna be a stoner. But, Grant could make no such promises. "Anyways, anyways, how's that whole situation with Henry?” 

“It’s… It’s Henry?” Grant said, more quizzically than anything. “I mean, the only reason they aren’t living together is ‘cause the twins and Paeden under one roof is an arson case in waiting.” And while, to Daniel that seemed like a joke. Grant watched those three interact in Faerun where they were mildly allowed to pull those stunts under the right circumstances. It was very much true. He thinks they did commit arson at one point.

Dad knocked on Grant’s window and singled for him to get out. Dammit, Grant was never allowed to drive with Paeden in the car. He obediently opened the door and climbed out, going over to the passenger side and fighting with Paeden for the handle before ultimately booting him to the back seat with Daniel. 

“Paeden, bud. This is the one time I will let you getting into a fight slide. Because, you had a legitimate reason to punch him this time.” Darryl informed as soon as all four were in the car. Grant silently wondered what that kid had to do for Paeden to have that fight slide. Grant never got off the hook anymore. 

“Damn right I had a reason! The Eye of the Tiger doesn’t swing without a reason, sonny boy.” Paeden chirped back in that nasally, pubescent voice as he buckled his seat belt. He was practically bouncing in the seat. 

Grant slumped down in his seat, pulling up his conversation with Kai to see if he was still amongst the living after whatever his mom needed to talk about. 

**Me:** You survive? 

**pupa pan:** barely. can i come over? 

**Me:** Sure, hold tight I’ll text Dad if we can run by and pick you up. We’re on that side of town anyway. 

Grant rarely asked dad prior to telling friends to come over if Dad was actually okay with that course of action, cause any friend Grant had was already practically Dad’s kid, after Faerun. 

“Hey, Dad, can we run by and grab Kai on our way home? He wants to come over and that’s pretty far to walk.” He turned off his phone and dropped it in his lap after asking the question, already knowing Dad would say yes and take the turn to go pick up Kai from his apartment building. 

* * *

Grant and Kai sat in a tangle of limbs on Grant’s mini-couch that he’d had in his bedroom for a couple years now. They were playing Minecraft on the TV and not really talking to each other. This was the dynamic they’d built over the years of online chat rooms. They didn’t need words, just knowing someone was on the other end of the line was enough sometimes. 

It caught Grant a little off guard when Kai set his controller down and moved to practically on top of him, but this also was pretty standard for Kai. Grant was gonna brush it off and keep playing, until he felt Kai start breathing uneven. 

They hadn’t really talked about what had happened with Kai’s mom earlier in the evening, cause it didn’t seem like Kai really wanted to. But, maybe he was just trying to avoid it? 

“What’s up, man? Wanna talk about it now?” Grant asked, setting the controller down on the floor next to him and adjusting his position so he could comfortably return the hug to Kai. 

“I- I just… Shit, Grant.” He mumbled, taking another shaky breath. Grant knew waterworks were coming, and Grant Wilson was not good with waterworks. He wasn’t good with emotions in general, but he had learned over the years that usually Kai didn’t want advice or anything. He just wanted a listening ear and Grant could provide that when he needed it. “I- um..” Kai started, climbing back off and Grant and moving so he sat on one half of the couch facing Grant, and Grant was on the other facing him. “She told me about my dad, I guess. It-” He stopped himself, his sentences sounding more like questions. He pressed the heels of his palms to his eyes and crumbled in on himself. Grant wished he knew what to do, but he didn’t. He had no idea how to handle this kind of breakdown in person. Throw him on a cell phone and he could work through it. He could figure out when Kai was thousands of miles away. It was a totally new ballpark to have Kai sitting right here, in front of him like this. It made it that much harder to know what to do to help

Grant’s eyes searched his room for something he could offer Kai as a comfort. While Grant did have his own mental health issues, he was still neurotypical. He knew Kai got ADHD from his mom, but he didn’t know the first thing about handling it. Lark’s was so different from Kai’s and Lark never really talked about the non-hyperactive side of it. He didn’t need to, it was really all that manifested for him. Kai barely had the hyperactivity of it, he got all the other symptoms to the max, but was still able to pass as neurotypical whereas Lark couldn't if he tried. 

There’s that large Mooshroom plush Grant had. He knew Kai had a couple plushies he relied on in situations like this from Kai giving him text updates during the bad nights. He grabbed it off the floor and offered it to Kai wordlessly. Of course Kai took it and gave a meek smile. It was moments like this Grant realized just how tiny Kai was. He was less than average height, and could probably still buy children’s sizes if he wanted to. Grant’s first thought when he met Kai in person last year was that he looked like an eight-year-old; he had the kind of build that he couldn’t bulk up even if he tried, collarbones like daggers and spindly spider legs that Grant always forgot just how long they are until they’re in situations exactly like this, where Kai has his legs criss-crossed and looks like some sort of strange spider waiting to scale a wall. 

“I-I don’t even know where to start with him, Grant. It’s all so fucked up. Did you know my mom’s name is actually Marie? She changed it to be able to hide from him. There’s so much to process. I don’t even know where to start. I guess I just suppressed all of my memories of him ‘cause he was so bad. B-but it makes sense when I think about it. I always thought I- I just had a bad memory! Or- or.. .Whatever. I didn't remember anything before Kindergarten, and that's just how it was. That's not normal, Grant! Did you know that?I thought that was normal! But it- it's not! I'm supposed to have memories of that shit! He wasn't gone until I was four, and my memory doesn't kick in until I'm five. It lines right up. I-I- Mom's been _actively_ keeping us hidden for a whole ass decade and I didn't even realize! God I feel so- so- so _stupid!_ ” Kai rambled, running his hands through his hair. Grant could feel the anxiety radiating off him. He reached forward to offer Kai a hug, but Kai flinched as soon as he made an effort to hug him. Okay, no hugs. Got it. 

Grant knew Kai was talking, explaining something Grant couldn’t listen long enough to hear. He was focused on the way Kai’s mouth moved to work around his braces as he spoke. The sadness was quickly turning into anger, and Grant could tell. He watched Kai move his hands frantically as he spoke. Kai had a painter’s hands. Dammit, Grant. Your best friend is having a mid-life crisis about everything he thought he knew about his family, and all you can think about it how elegant his hands are? Or how cute the lisp he had from the braces appliance on the roof of his mouth was... Or how the bands on his brackets were now a baby blue when they were yellow on when they did his portion of the mural. 

Kai wasn’t the usual type of person Grant went for, honestly. Grant usually liked guys taller than him. The kind that he could steal clothes off of and comfortably wrap his arms around their waist from behind. Kai was none of that. He was stunning to Grant, no doubt. But Grant was about four inches taller than him, and Grant's broader than Kai. The best comparison he could think of was a pencil and a full-size eraser. Maybe it was an infatuation with Kai actually being here in person, or maybe it was love. Mayb e this rapidly growing love is what happens when you see each other at your personal best and worst all at the same time, the results of so many nights spent consoling each other. Having their first experiences with death while standing next to each other in that North Dakota funeral home. Maybe love grew from the hours Grant and Kai sat with each other on the phone just crying through those hard months after Jax's death. The way, when they met at the diner prior to the funeral, they slammed into each other with so much force when they finally spotted each other at the Denny's before the official funeral began that Grant had the breath knocked out of him. The painful ways they've kept each other from having various kinds of relapses while they handled the trauma of their middle school experiences. How Kai never asked why Grant had suddenly changed so dramatically after Faerun and instead just started cheking in on his mental health more often, because he realized new issues had risen to the surface in that era. Perhaps, maybe, love laid in the silent nights where you needed nothing but someone else there for you when the world felt like it was crumbling. In how even though there were thousands of miles between them on those nights, it still felt like Kai was right there. Now Kai was here, in front of him. Kai was looking at him now, confusion on his face as he met Grant’s eyes for the first time since they've been here. 

“Grant? What? Why are you looking at me like that? Is something wrong?” It was then Grant had realized he’d been staring this entire time. Just… Staring. His brain short circuited for a moment, he forgot what someone was supposed to say in this kind of situation. The interaction that was supposed to happen. And, like an idiot, his brain blurted out the first statement that came to mind like he had done with Yeet Bigly back in middle school. 

“I think I’m in love with you, Kai.” 


	5. the one where they discuss some shared trauma

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW; minor descriptions of a panic attack (first scene), very brief mentioned of assumed suicide (final dialogue)

The words were out of Grant’s mouth before he realized he was saying them. As soon as he registered what words he just spoke out loud. To Kai. He did it again, god dammit. God damn brain, forgetting what a filter is the moment a pretty boy is in presence. The silence was killing him. The shock on Kai’s features told him all he needed to. 

“I-I mean..! Fuck- I didn’t- ignore me. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Kai. It-” He stammered, trying to find the words. A trembling starting in his ribs and spread outward to the rest of him, just like always when he got overwhelmed like this. The memories of how this was the very way he lost one of his best friends, this is the exact way he made Yeet Bigly uncomfortable to be around him. Now he’d ruined it with Kai too. Stupid emotions, stupid feelings, stupid heart. 

“I- okay, pause. We’re gonna talk about that, Grant.” Kai started, voice a bit unsure of himself. Grant could see the discomfort in his eyes, the terror in his expression. That was one thing Grant knew about Kai; he was an open book. Especially when you knew him for as long as Grant had. It was so easy to tell every emotion he was feeling at all times. 

Kai reached forward and grabbed Grant’s hands, sandwiching both between his own. “First, I need you to not panic. I know you’re gonna panic, and you need to not do that.” Sure, the words were supposed to be comforting, but they weren’t. Grant was already panicking, bouncing his leg on the ground as a way to try and distract himself from the rapidly growing amount of shaking his hands were doing, and the sinking feeling in his chest that felt like his lungs were being ripped apart. 

“Kai- I’m sorry, I- I didn’t mean it. F-forget I said anything I-” His voice was quickly rising in pitch and in the panic levels. He was thirteen again, sitting on those steps watching the utter disgust and confusion go into Yeet’s features as he gave him a similar confession of a crush. 

“Hey, GG, breathe. Am I freaking out? Nope, we’re all calm over here. We can’t talk about this if you panic.” It was a mini lecture, Grant knew that. He also knew that if he didn’t reign himself back under control in the next ten minutes Kai wouldn’t move on from this until he was calm enough to actually discuss it. Okay, Grant. Think. What does Dad always do to calm you down when you get like this? What was that list thing he did? Things you can see. 

“Bed, Kai… Sword, jersey-” 

“What are you doing?” 

“Calming down. Quite. Dresser.” He kept glancing around his room at the various items. Things he could touch. Touch… “Plush… Couch, Kai, hoodie.” The shaking settled as he got through what he could hear, and he felt okay to look Kai to look in the eye. “O-okay, go.” 

“Are you sure? You’re good?” Kai wanted to double and triple check that Grant was totally okay before he started this conversation, because he knew that if Grant tried to go into serious conversations like this when he  _ wasn’t  _ okay it’d cause a panic attack in various forms of severity. Grant nodded slowly, looking Kai in the eye for the first time in awhile. It was good. “Okay, I’m gonna start talking now. You just tell me if you need me to slow down or stop.” he squeezed Grant’s hands, refusing to let go of them. These were his hands to hold at the moment, and simple things like this helped him keep himself grounded in reality. 

“Y-ye.. Okay, just- say it.” 

“I’m not- Grant, are you serious about what you said?” Kai waited for the nod. He knew Grant didn’t really want to talk right now, and he was okay with that. “I- I-I’m not.. I’m not turning you down, Grant. But- um… Right now, I know I’m not in the spot to be in a relationship, it just wouldn't be smart. It’d be impossible to make it work between everything going on. Ya know, with Dad and school and building friendships and just.. Life. So- on- on what you said… Let’s- let’s take this in baby steps. Okay?” Grant looked like a kicked puppy, tail between his legs and whine in his throat. Kai sighed and pulled him into the tightest hug he could. “I promise I’m not mad or anything, Grant. Emotions are fucking weird.” 

It’s not that Kai  _ wasn’t  _ interested in Grant. It’s that he knew he couldn’t handle adding anything else to his plate right now, especially something like a whole boyfriend. Sure, it’s Grant, but that’s still a whole boyfriend that Kai isn't ready for. They sat in silence for a little while, Kai tracing figures on Grant’s back. Kai watched the door to Grant’s room open, his little brother poking in. Kai knew  _ of  _ Paeden. He remembered how surprised he was when Grant told him his dad was adopting a kid with his boyfriend. 

The eye contact kai made with Paeden was probably some of the most awkward he’s had. It was obvious the middle schooler didn’t know how to react to coming in to Grant crying. He looked between the two boys, then did a kind of two-fingered salute to Kai. 

“I have entered to inform you that dinner has been served, and my son would like you at the table cause What’s-His-Name’s here!” He informed, ducking back out of the room just as quickly. Kai chuckled as he watched him. Paeden was a cut kid, Grant says he used to be really violent when they first got him, but mellowed out once Henry and Darryl adopted him. 

“His son? Who’s that?” Kai asked, trying to lighten the mood as he let go of Grant and stood up.. Grant gave an amused grin and stretched his back out with a sigh. 

‘It’s Dad, it’s just a thing he does. Ignore him.” He stood up himself, adjusting the mooshroom to sit cozily on the couch and putting his hands in the pocket of his hoodie. “Anyway, my brother’s in for the week, as you saw. I think Henry’s gonna be-” A crashing and a victorious shout from one of the twins informed the two of the Oaks arrivals, “Correction; Henry’s here.” 

* * *

Grant covered his face as he felt his cheeks heat up at the increasingly inappropriate jokes from Dad and Mercedes. And they wondered why he never came down for dinner? It was impossible to get Dad and Mercedes to stop bouncing them off each other once they started and it never failed to make Grant wish he had stayed in Faerun. Kai seemed to be amused by Mercedes and Dad’s antics, which Grant supposed was good enough. But that didn’t mean he had to enjoy their antics. He hated them, actually. Like, no one wanted to hear their dad and weird sort-of stepmom thing crack jokes about sex at dinner  _ in front of his salad.  _ He’s trying to eat here! 

“Okay, okay, cut it out. You’re making our boys uncomfortable!” Henry chuckled, patting Darryl on the shoulder. 

Lark and Sparrow were both groaning overdramatically, lark with his head thrown back over his chair and hands over his face, and Sparrow with his head slammed on the table. Equally dramatic. Lark then stood up and took his and Sparrow’s plate and set them in the sink.   
“We should go to the skatepark!” He announced, looking between his two friends and brother. He looked very excited, and Grant always had a weak spot for the twins when they got excited about something, so he nodded and stood up, moving his own plate to the sink. 

“Yeah, sure. But we can’t stay out late. Dad’s still gotta drive Kai home later.” He stuffed his hands in his pocket, trying to ignore the couple of phone vibrations from his Discord server. The roleplay had been getting intense on that one lately, and he really didn’t wanna deal with it tonight. He also realized he should make sure Kai was okay with heading to skatepark if they were going to go to it, because Kai wasn’t always very vocal about  _ not  _ wanting to do something. “What about you, KK? You good with heading down there?” He asked, reaching over Kai to move his dirty dishes to the sink. 

“Uh- yeah, sure. Thanks.” He nodded, giving one of his signature smiles and standing up. All four boys glanced at the adults, to make sure they were okay with this course of action. Dad shrugged and took a sip of his beer. 

“As long as you take Paeden with you, I don’t mind. Just be back before dark so I can get Kai home.” Paeden practically  _ frothed  _ at hearing he got to go with the ‘big kids’ to the skatepark. Paeden usually wasn’t allowed to tag along on adventures because he had his own group of friends, and Grant didn’t like his little brother coming along with him to his safe places that he used specifically to avoid his family when he was done dealing with them for the day. 

“Yeah, alright. Just- don’t fuck with our stuff, Paeden.” Grate replied, exiting the kitchen with Kai after him to go put on his shoes and grab his board. Lark and Sparrow didn’t skate, but they liked messing around on the equipment, and Grant needed to practice some of his tricks so he could catch up to Nick. 

The skatepark was just as empty as always, and it was perfect. Grant grinned and took a running start towards a small ramp, hopping on and losing his balance almost  _ instantly _ . Of course he eats shit in front of Kai as soon as he attempts to skate around him. He sighed and climbed back to his feet, quickly grabbing his board before it could get too far away from him. He could hear Lark’s obnoxious laugh at his failure, and Sparrow’s slightly more respectful chuckle. 

Paeden appeared in front of him as he got to his feet, that cocky grin on his face. Oh no. Paeden wordlessly held up his phone, then snickered and went running the other direction. Why did Henry have to get Paeden a phone? Like, he knows Paeden needs a way to communicate with the parents cause he’s notorious for disappearing into the abyss and reappearing god knows where, but still! At least get him one without a camera, so he can’t blackmail Grant like this! 

“Hey! Give me that you little shit!” Grant cursed scrambling to get up and chase Paeden down and delete that damn clip before he sent it to the Doodler’s server. Nick would never let him hear the end of it if he saw Grant eat shit like that! But, of course, Paeden and his freaky Faerunian agility managed to get up higher on the equipment than Grant would dare even attempt. Stupid Paeden and his stupid supernatural climbing abilities. He is a Barbarian, Grant supposed. But that made no reason for Paeden to be so damn agile at everything! It was impossible to catch up to Paeden when it came to him and athletics. 

“Hey! Paeden Jamison- whatever the fuck your last name is, get down here! I can and will send you back to Faerun you little shit!” He cussed, hoping to intimidate his little brother into coming back down. Brother? Grandfather? Honestly, who knew how Paeden was related to the Wilson’s, he just was one of them. Somehow.   
“You better! I could beat ass in Faerun!” he snickered, scrambling back down to stand next to Grant once more. He offered the phone back up with a smug look. Grant snatched it back and checked what the hell Paeden had done. Sent it to Nicolas Morgan Close. Great.   
“Hey, Grant?’ He heard Kai call, so of course all his focus went very swiftly from his simmering rage at Paeden’s shitty self to the fact Kai had just beckoned his attention. What else was he supposed to do?

“Yeah, Kai?” He muttered, turning to look at him. God, he had so many freckles Grant felt like more appeared every time he looked at him. It was one of the many adorable attributes of Kai Levesque. He watched as Kai gestured to the sleeve of his hoodie vaguely. 

“It got ripped. I guess when you fell.” He pointed out. Clearly, Kai didn’t realize  _ which  _ hoodie Grant was wearing. 

Before he could even register he was moving, Grant was tearing off his hoodie to assess the damage. A thing he never did in front of anyone anymore. Grant Randall Wilson was never seen out of long sleeves anymore. Not since sixth grade. Lark and Sparrow looked shocked, and Paeden was left speechless. Now that he thought about it, Grant doesn't think Paeden’s ever seen him without a hoodie on. 

Sure enough, on the elbow of the left arm it was ripped clean through. Grant felt like the air had just been forced out of his lungs. He ripped it. He fucking ripped it. He knew he shouldn’t wear this one to skate in, but it’s a comfort and it’s so close to the anniversary and he can’t stop thinking about Him and- is Grant crying? Oh- oh… Maybe he is. He wasn't as surprised as he should be. 

“Brother Wilson!” Sparrow gasped, running over and gently wiping Grant’s cheeks. “No need for tears, brother. Father can sew! He could easily fix it!” He tried to sound uplifting and optimistic, tried to make Grant feel better. But it didn’t make him feel better. Not one bit. 

“That- that’s not the problem, Sparrow.” He groaned, pressing the old and worn down fabric to his face. “T-the hoodie. It's- it’s Jax’s and I-” He cut himself off. He didn't wanna get into this tonight. He didn’t wanna deal with this tonight. “God, today fucking sucks.” 

Kai was the first to say something, probably was the only one who knew who Jax was. He stepped forward, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Hey, hey, don’t panic. It’s fixable. I know it’s his, but it can be fixed. Here. let me see. The hoodie’s black. So even the stitching will be easy to hide.” Kai assured, tucking Grant’s hair behind his ear. “If you want, you can take the ring until we get it fixed. I-i have a couple shirts of his to wear incase I need to, so I’m not worried.” Kai took the necklace off from around his neck. He’d never taken it off in the time he’d been 

“Who’s Jax?’ The twins asked, in sync as always. Grant hated and loved how alike they could be at times. It was a welcome familiarity. 

“Jax…” Kai began, looking to Grant for permission to talk about this part of their history. Grant sighed and nodded. “Jax is…” Kai took a deep breath. “Let’s sit down and talk about it yeah? I can give you a short version, a short version to get to the point and then elaborate, or a long version.” He rambled, the lisp slipping out just a little bit. 

Paeden, Lark and Sparrow all shared a look. They shrugged, and soon all five boys were seated on the half-pipe, Kai having one arm around Grant who was still mindlessly clutching at the ripped hoodie.   
“Jax was… he was a friend of ours.” Kai started. 

“Best friend.” Grant interjected. 

“Yeah, our best friend. All internet pals. And… About a year ago-” 

“He went missing.”

“Ruled a suicide. But, his body was ever found. They just found the note. Um…’ 

“I think he’s in Faerun, They just found a wrecked car on the highway. No body, no leads, nothing. Just like what happened to us. I want to go look for him.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi Jax ;:) 
> 
> This chapter is a little shorter than i normally like to make them. But ah, aha... you thought Wilvesque was gonna be the only plotline we'll follow?


	6. the one where he thought she was kidding.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> CW; more mentions of Jax's death/possible suicide, discussion of car accidents in this one during Kai and Nick's scene (scene 2). Nothing goes in depth, but the conversation topic is still there.

Grant sighed, setting his phone on the counter as he reached up into his cabinets to grab a glass and make a cup of chocolate milk. He could hear TJ coming through the speaker, talking to Cynthia about something for a moment. The chocolate syrup was almost totally out, which made it difficult for Grant to squeeze out enough to get a decent glass of milk for him and Paeden. 

“Yeah, so, anyway Grant. You really did it again?” Teej snorted, clearly trying to make fun of Grant for his amateur actions in the region of romancing other teenage boys. 

“At this point I should just make it my brand to confess my love during a mental breakdown.” He chided, taking a seat on the couch with his milk and letting Bigly climb up and lay his head in Grant’s lap. 

“Yeah, man. Isn’t that also how you asked what’s-his-name to the dance in freshman year? It was like- Joshua or some shit.” Teej thought out loud, Grant thinks he could hear him working on homework for something. Grant settled on the couch, letting Bigly lay on him as they sat there together. It was so comforting to have him right there. 

“Yeah, so I did  _ that.  _ Then we went to skatepark and i may have accidentally said a little too much about Faerun and now he thinks I’m actively keeping secrets, which makes me feel so fucking guilty you don’t even know man.” Grant groaned, looking up as Paeden came in and took his glass of milk off the counter. He watched as Paeden effortlessly downed the entire glass then came over to the couch. Grant moved Bigly over so Paeden could replace him. Paeden had moments like this sometimes, where he just wanted to drape across one of his immediate family and know they were physically there. 

“You did not. God, okay. So we gotta tell Kai about Faerun now?” 

“That would be preferred, yes.” Paeden sat up for a moment, nodding towards the guest bedroom that was within earshot, the room Daniel was currently staying in. Daniel and Paeden didn’t really get on as well as Dad had wanted them to, but who could really blame them both? They were nearly fifteen years age difference and Daniel wasn’t good with preteens. 

“It’s chill, Denny. Him and Dad went out for lunch together.” Grant assured, grunting as Paeden wordlessly flopped back on top of him. Paeden had days like this sometimes, where he really didn’t have many words. He also had days where Grant really wished he’d just stop talking for two seconds. 

“Hm, is Paeden there? Sup, little man?” Teej asked, to which Paeden promptly stuffed his face in the crook of Grant’s neck.  _ I don’t want to talk.  _ Grant had learned to read Paeden pretty well over the years. 

“No words today, sorry man.” He replied, carefully moving his legs so he was a bit more comfortable under the quickly growing weight of his brother. When Paeden was a malnourished, scrawny eight-year-old it was no big deal to let him just collapse his weight on top of Grant. But, as Paeden hit his middle-school growth spurt, in the past months Grant had found it a bit more of a chore to have Paeden lay completely on top of him like he likes. Grant won’t make him stop, however. He knows how much comfort these moments brings Paeden, especially on days when the memories of Willy were running rampant. 

“Oh, I gotcha. Well, hi anyways Paeden.” Teej still didn’t really know much about Paeden’s neurodivergence, and neither did anyone else really. All they really knew was that Paeden was definitely not neurotypical, but any psychiatrist they took him to just tried to peg him ‘introvert,’ ‘overactive imagination,’ or whatever the fuck. The one Dad just found for him seemed to be willing to listen to him, though like everyone she dismissed the stories of Willy and the UFC. 

Grant watched Paeden’s eyes go to his half-empty glass of milk. Paeden was watching that glass of chocolate milk like a cat stalking prey. He looked at a lot of things like that. 

“You can go ahead and have it, Paeden. I’ll get a soda or something.” Paeden lit up, sitting up for long enough to grab the glass and chug it. “You hungry? I could make some Hamburger Helper, I think we still have a box.” Another thing about Paeden; you  _ always  _ had to offer him food or else he wouldn’t eat. No matter how many times Darryl assured him he could just cook whenever he wanted or snack whenever he wanted, Paeden didn’t eat unless it was given to him. And, maybe Grant was feeling peckish. 

With a nod from the ginger disaster of a pre-teen, Grant stood up and headed to the kitchen. He let Paeden do whatever it was Paeden wanted to do, leaving the TV remotes in sight and headed into the kitchen to fix lunch for the two of them. Hamburger helper was tad more effort to make than mac n cheese, but it was an end all with Paeden. The one thing you always knew for a fact he would eat. Grant had learned to make two boxes anytime, because Paeden would easily eat a whole box without trying to. Teej was rambling on about what strange happenings had gone on at the Stampler-Harker household over the last few days. Grant wasn’t really paying attention as he began the mission of cooking Paeden his lunch exactly how he liked it, but chiming in when he needed to so TJ didn’t feel like he was talking to a wall. 

‘Okay- okay. Paeden seems to want to watch cartoons and eat pasta, so I’m gonna let you go. Think something happened to him, I dunno.” Grant cut in, noticing how Paeden pressed his fingers back too far and stared at the TV screen with the cursor hovering on Ninjago. Now, Grant didn’t have the first clue of what could be bothering Paeden, but he was gonna try and figure it out. He’ll go grab the laptop and open up their Google Doc, let Paeden voice out all his thoughts for Grant into it and read it over as they always did. 

“Oh, for sure! Alright. I’ll see you later, Grant. Plan that meeting with Kai, I can give him the run down if you want.” 

“Oh, definitely. Okay. bye. Love you.” 

“Love you too.” And he listened for the familiar click of the phone hanging up. Oh lord. 

_________________________________________________

The apartment was always lonely when Mama was at work, which is why Kai was rather grateful Nickie had decided to have an impromptu ‘vibe’ tonight. Kai wasn’t really used to friends just showing up, back home-  _ back in Kentucky _ , he lived in a rural town, so any friend gatherings he had had to be planned out days in advance. But up here, Nickie was just a few short blocks away and anyone further than that he could use public transit. It was a strange concept to him and he wasn’t quite used to it yet. Nicholasville never had public transit for shit.

He got up off the couch where he and Nickie were sitting together to grab a soda from the fridge. Grabbing one familiar green glass bottle out of the fridge he looked back over to Nickie. 

“Hey, you want an Ale-8?” Kai asked, quickly twisting the bottle top off of his and taking a quick drink as he waited for the response. Out of the corner of his eye he could tell she had sat up slightly from her slouched position. 

“The hell is an Ale-8? Woah, Kai you stealing Jeanne’s beer?” The statement took a hot minute for Kai to process. He didn’t think twice about Ale-8, it was just a better ginger ale. Like if Sprite and Canada Dry had some weird love child. Equally good at room temperature and ice cold, hell, warm Ale-8 was good. He looked at the bottle in his hand then over at Nickie with confusion. 

“You’ve never heard of Ale-8?” He asked, displaying the bottle for Nickie to see. Said individual only looked even more confused at that comment. 

“I’ve literally never heard of that in my  _ life,  _ Kyle.” 

“Well, then,  _ Nicole.  _ Try one.” He grabbed a second one out of the fridge and knocked it shut with his hip, striding the short distance back over to the couch and handing Nick the beverage before sinking back into his spot with a bit more pazazz than needed. Nickie shrugged and pulled the hem of her shirt over the cap, twisting quickly and popping it off. Kai was a little surprised she got it so easily, though he supposed he shouldn’t be. Considered Nickie was no stranger to alcohol and often got in Glenn’s liquor cabinet if her stories were anything to go off of. 

Kai watched in silent anticipation as Nickie took a sip of the chilled ginger soda. Nickie seemed to contemplate the taste for a moment, before nodding and giving a slight shrug. 

“It is indeed a soda, Kyle.” She stated, leaning back into her comfortable slouch on the couch. Kai felt almost offended Nickie was so underwhelmed. Did she not know that this was the drink of the gods? Was she unaware of the literal Ale-8 cult that were Kentucky teenagers? 

“Wow, homophobia.” Kai sighed, taking another drink of his own bottle. Nickie went quiet for a beat then started laughing. 

‘What? That I’m not wowed by your redneck ginger ale?” She snickered, nudging Kai. 

“Ale-8 is a god tier beverage, up there with grape Faygo and Dr. Pepper, probably higher. No cap.” Kai explained, pulling his legs up onto the couch because sitting with his feet on the floor was a language he hadn’t spoken since fifth grade. 

“Bold of you to think something can top grape Faygo, little man.” Nickie retorted, taking another swig of her own Ale-8 and Kai reached for the remote control. 

“Did you really think I was getting us beer?” Kai blurted, thinking back on Nickie’s comment when he first brought out the drinks. At first Kai didn’t think too much of the comment, but now it was chewing at him. Kai wasn’t the kid to sneak his moms alcohol when she wasn’t home even if he knew she wouldn’t care if he drank any. Hell, she’d offer him a glass of wine when he has a rough day sometimes. Like on the night he found out about Jax, she gave him a glass of wine and sat with him until morning. 

“I mean, yeah man. If you haven’t caught on, I’m not exactly the cleanest kid.” Nickie laughed, brushing her bangs out of her eyes. “Grant and I have gotten real fucked up before. I didn’t tell you that, though. Darryl finds out Grant parties with me sometimes, our whole schtick is  _ over. _ He'd never let him leave the house.” Kai never really thought about that. How Nickie may get on with the rest of the boys in her partying habits- well, boys plus Sparrow. Kai wasn’t sure if Sparrow liked being called a boy, Nickie had mentioned in passing once that Sparrow was playing around with nonbinary identities for a bit, but to keep it quiet so the parents didn’t find out. Kai couldn't respect that, he still wasn’t exactly sure what he was supposed to  _ call  _ Sparrow. He should text them about that later. And now he’s gone off to some railway he wasn't supposed to in this particular situation, which he finds himself doing quite a lot lately. 

“Hm, I mean I can’t say I’m surprised.” Kai admitted, leaning his head back and looking at the ceiling. His thoughts of Sparrow made his brain veer quickly into the conversation he’d had with the twins and grant the skatepark just a few days prior. They never did his questions. 

_ What’s Faerun? Why would Jaxton be there? He’s  _ dead,  _ Grant. He’s been dead for eleven months.  _

_ Kai- shit, I- I know you probably have a lot of questions about what we’re talking about. I will answer them. Just uh- just let me talk to Teej and Nimic first.  _

Nimic. Another Doodler inside the term Kai had to learn meant Nickie. He wasn’t sure where the nickname came from, but Grant and Terry Jr seemed to call her it at random times. He wondered what was so important about this content that Grant had to consult the entire friend group about it before telling Kai what they were talking about but he guessed he really wouldn’t know the entire thing until such a meeting was called. Or, maybe he could ask Nicole Close, who was sitting across from him. 

“Grant said something the other day. About some O-dads, or some shit. And Faerun. Can you tell me what that’s about?” he felt the tension in Nickie’s body skyrocket. 

“Kai, before- before I answer that. I-I have one question.” 

“Yeah?”

“Jax- sorry, I know this is a sore spot. But, when Jax died, they found his wrecked car, right?” 

“Yeah.” 

“And there was no body? It was just- assumed dead?’ 

“Um… Yeah.” 

“Awesome. Great. Epic.” Nickie groaned, quickly standing up and setting her drink down on the in-table and pacing around the living room for a few seconds before turning abruptly on her heels and facing Kai. “What highway?” She said, no other context. Her voice was focused like the answer to this question had high stakes riding on it.

“Um… I74, I think. I’m not completely sure.” Kai stopped for a moment. He felt the welling tears in his eyes and he subconsciously reached for the brass ring he wore on a necklace chain because it was too big to fit on his hand. His fingers wrapped around the pendant, clutching tightly. He was acutely aware of how he got the ring. It was Jaxton’s ring, the only trace of him left in the car after the wreck. It was the  _ wreck.  _ Kai wouldn’t say suicide. He refused to admit it was a suicide, even if they found the note in his bedroom, even if all signs pointed o it being a suicide. He wouldn’t say it. Because that meant Jaxton had broken his promise. Jaxton never broke a promise. 

“I hate to break this to you, Kai. But I don’t think Jaxton’s dead. I think he’s being held hostage.” Something in Kai snapped, a grip on reality and temper he usually kept a keen grip on because he hated letting his emotions get the best of him. He hated getting  _ angry.  _ But this? Nickie joking about Jaxton’s death like it was something to be joked about? It tore something in him, pushed a button he hadn’t had pushed before. Kai racked his brain coming up with a reason why Nickie thought it was even remotely okay for her to joke about Jaxton like this. Like she hadn’t seen how much grief his death put Grant through. Kai knew Nickie had seen that.

He was on his feet, fists clenched so tight he could feel his nails digging into his palms. Kai grabbed Nickie by her collar, shoving her roughly against the back wall that was barely two feet behind them. His apartment was pitifully small. 

“Nickie, I swear to fucking Jesus Christ, if you joke about Jaxton again I will deck your ass so hard you’ll be punched into next week-” 

“I’m not joking, Kai.” She looked calm, almost like she expected this. But she had to be joking. She had to be. He felt the tears on his cheeks, like a burning fire tracing down his face. 

“You’re sick, Nickie. Taking my best fucking friend’s death and turn it into some cruel humor-” He let her go, shoving himself back and pacing anxious steps around his floor. “Did you know i was on the phone when it happened? When he wrecked? It was his first time driving by himself. He was so nervous about it, too. He never expected to make it to driving age, we all thought we’d be dead by high school. But i was going into my freshman year, Grant was starting his sophomore, and Jax was-” 

“Kai, I joke about a lot of fucking things. But if there is one thing I will  _ never  _ joke about, it’s dying in a car wreck.” 

“And why the fuck would I believe that?” 

“Because that’s how my mom died. I was in the damn car with her. It’s horrific, and I’m so sorry you had to listen to that. I know how much that shit hurts. But- I’m gonna tell you something, and you have to believe. It’s gonna crazy and absurd and downright stupid, but you have to believe me. Because every word of is true. Every word. I swear.” Nickie grabbed him by the shoulders, forced him to look her in the eye and he was a bit shocked by the way she was acting. He’d never seen her act this way. It made him want to believe her. He took a deep breath and brushed her hands off him. He silently walked over to Clara’s cage, and when Nickie tried to say something, Kai held up a hand to silence her. He grabbed Clara’s blanket from the drawer to the dresser she sat on top of and pulled her out, cradling the little rodent against his chest. 

Nickie went to speak again, but Kai once again gestured for her silence. He sat down on the couch and moved his ring pendant to be behind his neck. 

“Okay. I’m listening.” 


	7. the one where they drove down a highway

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know not everyone who reads this follows my other socials, so here's the lowdown; as of now this fic will be continued until completion. This story will be the only public involvement I will retain with the Dungeons and Daddies podcast until further notice, any other fics I've posted will stay posted. Right now, given the situation this fandom is not a super safe space for me (as a minor) and I will stay as detached from it as I can until a) change is made or b) this fic is finished and I can completely detach myself. I've put far too much planning and time into this story for me to scrap it all now, so until further notice this is will continue as normal. 
> 
> No content warnings for this chapter, other than Nick explaining the Faerun adventures very bluntly

Kai pulled his knees into his chest and let Clara clamber around on his hands and arms as she pleased. Nickie didn’t sit down, she stayed standing a few feet away from Kai. 

“First, I gotta call the boys. Hold on.” She said, pulling out her phone and setting it down after a few minutes. He could see open a Discord voice chat, the first person to come in was TJ, then Lark and Sparrow, and lastly Grant. But they filed in so fast it was freaky. “Okay. Kai, this- this whole thing is gonna sound bonkers as hell, but you have to believe me. I swear to fuck I’m sober. The rest of the gang are here to chime in if I miss something. So, a long story boiled down into one sentence that barely scratches the surface; our grandparents kidnapped us into another dimension in middle school.” Kai blinked a couple times. He wasn’t quite sure how to respond. If Nickie wasn’t assuring him she was sober, he’d think she was definitely on something. But, he didn’t get time to simmer in his thoughts because she continued immediately after that sentence. 

“Okay. Now for context. Three-ish years ago, when Teej and I were in seventh grade, we were going to a soccer tournament. We were on highway 174, and we got trapped in Faerun by our grandparents, who managed to essentially achieve the power of god. Um…” She pulled at the fishnet gloves on her hands, kicking herself in the heel. Which had to hurt considered the beasts of Demonias she had on. Maybe it was a way she was keeping herself steady? Kai hadn’t seen Nickie get genuinely serious before, which may not be much considering they'd only known each other a couple months at this point, but Kai had seen every other Doodler have a moment of seriousness at least once from August to now, where they’re nearing the holiday months. Even Lark had his moment. 

“Are you okay?” Kai cut in, seeing the nervousness in her movements. He always had to make sure in situations like this. Just like with Grant, Nickie would push herself too hard in favor of keeping up her cool kid persona until she snaps. 

“I’m… Fine. I’ve just never talked about this out loud before, at least not to someone who wasn’t… Ya know,  _ there.  _ So, it’s just trying to piece together all the facts and storyline to put together something coherent. Ya know?” She explained, pulling her fishnets away from her hands and letting them snap back in place. 

“W-we all went through some tough shit in that place, Kai. Lark almost got killed by a crumbling pyramid. I-I was caught up in a drug ring. TJ watched his dad die, for the second time. Grant had to rip apart a person from the inside out or let himself be cannibalized. It- it was horrific, and traumatizing. And that’s not even the beginning, man! It sucked  _ ass. _ To this day I can’t watch wrestling matches without my skin crawling. We…” Nickie seemed to stop herself and heavily think over what she was about to say, which kind of concerned Kai. Considering that she didn’t flinch about telling him about Grant almost being  _ cannablized. _ “Paeden came from that dimension. Ron’s dad- he um… It’s fucked. It’s fucked, Kai. He-” The speed of her words was picking up, like she didn’t want to be going over this. “Willy made Darryl’s dad into this little fucking kid and made us bring him around with us on our adventures and Paeden doesn’t remember any of it, because to keep Paeden we had to erase any memory of Frank he would’ve had and- and… And  _ Mom.” _ Kai pulled himself off the couch, setting Clara down in his place and walked over to Nickie. She looked so, so scared. He carefully took her hands, pressing both between his own like he had with Grant just a few nights earlier. 

“Breathe, Nickie. Breathe.” She bent down to rest her head on his shoulder. Kai wonders if this reaction would’ve been worse if it had been one of the others telling him this tale. Hell, he wasn’t sure if he believed this. But whatever this really was, the trauma it left on them was real. And that was enough for Kai. Multiple crackling voices were coming through the phone. He could pick out TJ specifically. 

“Kai- Kai if she’s freaking out lay her down. She might pass out- Kai lay her down.” His tone was frantic. But, Kai listened. TJ knew what he was talking about when it came to his friends' care. And sure enough, as soon as Kai got her on the ground she was out. 

And that was all Kai had on that for nearly two weeks. No one talked about it after that. The conversation was had. All the thousands of questions he had would go unanswered. He never would know what had happened to these kids for sure. He could only guess. Until, Grant texted him at ten o’clock one night. 

**wishgranted; meet at the skatepark tonight at one. Pack for camping. We’re gonna go look for JJ**

* * *

It was late, Grant knew it was late. He should be in bed. He shouldn’t be doing this. It’s been two weeks since they told Kai about Faerun. About Jaxton. They’d been planning this since then. He stuffed a few more water bottles in his backpack, and as many snacks as it would hold. He had an extra change of clothes, a sleeping back, and other necessities. Grant closed the fridge as quietly as possible, spotting the silhouette of Paeden in the doorway. He looked so tired, 

“Grant… Where are you going?” His voice sounded scared. They made eye contact in the dark night. Grant could tell Paeden wasn’t really awake, and he could make a pretty easy lie here to get him to go back to sleep. One thing he wasn’t gonna do was tell Paeden he was going on a trip to Faerun. 

“Need to clear my head, I’m going for a quick walk. I’ll be home soon, just go back to bed, Denny.” He walked over and ruffled Paeden’s hair, shoving him half heartedly back toward his room. Grant felt the guilt weighing on his heart for lying to Paeden.  _ I’m sorry, bud. I promise I’ll be home by eight to make you breakfast.  _ He watched him go back to his room and smiled. 

Grant headed for the front door. Stopping for a moment outside Dad’s room. He contemplated for a moment leaving a note in case it took longer than he expected. In case he wasn’t home by morning. Grant could see the rough outlines of Dad and Henry both sleeping peacefully. He thought the better of it. He was going to be home before anyone woke up. They had one mission; go in, track down Jax (or find out if he is just dead and this was all some crazy theory Grant came up with), come home and sleep until next week. 

“Bye, Dad. I love you, see you tomorrow.” he whispered, more of a prayer than anything. He remembered vividly just how dangerous Faerun was the first time they went through, just how horrifying it was. He was praying he’d make it back to see his family tomorrow, and maybe that’s the pessimist in him. 

Closing his hand on the doorknob, he debated calling this whole thing off. Was it really that worth it? That’s the stupidest question Grant’s ever asked. This is Jaxton Wall, he’s talking about. The best friend he’s not been able to get out of his head for the last eleven months. Every waking moment Grant thought about his laugh, that grin, the scar on his lip. He missed those little things. Even when they’d blow up each other’s Minecraft builds for the hell of it and laughing about it later as they spent hours recreating the creations. It all seemed so far away, he just wished he could have a redo of those years. When life was still simple. Before all the trauma and sexual awakenings and religious guilt and watching Mom and Dad fall out of love. 

The door cracked, he kept it as quiet as he could as he slipped out into the chilled night air without another word. He stepped down the front steps, adjusting the overfilled backpack on his shoulders and looking back to his home. His home where his two brothers slept. His home where he watched his dad fall out of love, and regain it just as quickly. His home where he’s spent the best and worst days of his life. Days crying of laughter in the kitchen with his best friends, and spending hours sobbing on the floor unable to say anything but scream as Dad held him until he couldn't cry anymore. 

_ I promise you I’ll be home by eight.  _

_ \----------- _

Nick could still hear the sound of the TV in the living room still. They weren’t sure if Glenn and Robin were even still awake and watching it, but they weren’t taking the risk of getting caught. Not that Glenn would stop them from this. They opened their bedroom window and climbed out onto the fire escape, grabbing their bag and slipping it through afterwards. They took a deep breath and looked at the descent they had before them. Be back by morning. They looked back into the apartment. They hated this place so much, but it was still home. It was still… Home. A fucked up, lonely home that was empty more often than it was full. Where the scent of Dad’s weed and alcohol was so thick sometimes even Nick got taken back by it. 

They sighed and shut the window. They didn’t mumble a goodbye, they didn’t look back. They simply descended down the fire escape and started on their way to the skatepark. 

\---------------------------------

Kai never snuck out. Not once in his life has he snuck out of the house and away from his mother. He’s never needed to. But Grant had told him specifically to not tell his mom where they were going. He was worried about what was happening, he’d double-checked and triple checked with every member of the Doodlers that Grant wasn’t leading him like a lamb to the slaughter and that this was actually for a reason. He was assured by TJ that this was no scheme. Which made him a little more scared, to be honest. 

Now he sat in the back of Mr. Wilson’s van as Nick drove them down the backroads of their town with a sense of urgency Kai didn’t quite understand. There was silence over the other people in the car he didn’t like either. This whole situation he didn’t like. The only semblance of context he could get out of anyone was that they were going to Faerun, but Kai really had no idea what that meant anymore. The radio wasn’t even playing anymore, which added an air of spooky Kai really hated. He looked over to Lark and Sparrow, who were both watching Nick, Lark leaned forward in his seat with one hand reaching over the back of the driver’s seat to hold onto Nick’s shoulder and Sparrow sitting cross legged in his seat and silently watching. The Oak twins were not ones to sit in silence. 

They exited onto the highway. Highway 174.The same highway that claimed Jaxton eleven months and sixteen days ago. Kai felt the air get forced out of his lungs as he realized this was the road they were on, but he wasn’t the only one. The whole car seemed to catch their breath as the turn was made. 

“Teej?” Nick didn’t even need to say anything else, because almost cutting them off was Terry Junior from the back row of seats, where he sat sideways with some trinkets laid out in front of him and an old book open in his lap. 

“Ready when you are, Nemic.” 

“A-alright. Birdie?” 

“Indeed.”

“Lovewolf?” 

“Seconded.” 

“G-man?” 

“If I say yes will you get it over with?” 

“Kyle?” Kai sat there. He didn’t know what was being asked. What he was being expected to answer here. He couldn’t flow seamlessly with these five, he didn’t know each person like he knew himself. The rest of them seemed to be having an entire conversation with only one word. “Kyle, are you ready?” 

“Ready for what?” His voice cracked, the fear evident. Though, by the way Grant’s hands were shaking he was rightfully afraid. 

“Faerun.” Was Nick’s response as they laced their fingers into Grant’s, clutching with a grip to tight their hand turned white. 

“I guess I have to be.” 

Nick tried to clear their head as they shut off the headlights. Murmurs and words from their passengers falling into white noise as he tried to focus his senses on the feeling of Gran’t hand in theirs, and their foot planted firmly on the gas pedal. A moment's hesitation, a silent prayer that this wouldn’t all be for nothing, and their foot pressed down… Down… Down… The car was speeding up to a rate that made Nick scared to check the speedometer. In the back of their mind, they could hear their moms gleeful laugh just moments before their crash. Fuck, too fast. Too fast. Slow- 

“Nick don’t you dare.” Grant hissed over the sound of the roaring engine, hand clutching his tighter. The night sky sped by as Nick felt the tears well up. Were they shaking?

Their foot hit the floor, the highway was going by too fast. Too fast. “Terry.” Their voice sounded small, seeking an affirmation that this was going as planned. 

“Working on it.” Teej replied, beginning his incantations and whatever the fuck kinda words he had to say to start this spell up. The purple dotted the edges of Nick’s vision, vortex appearing far ahead of them on the highway. Nick felt the scream bubble up, but couldn’t hear their shriek over the roar of the engine and whirling of the portal. The corners of his vision quickly filled with that familiar deep purple as they entered the vortex, the world fading into black as the screaming of members of the car went silent. They had entered the portal. 


	8. the one where he realized he's not in california anymore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> mild cw; second-hand descriptions of minor anxiety attack and sensory overload

The familiar white noise of the Faerunian forest was what woke Grant. It was such a missed sound that he felt a swell of affection from simply the background noise of the strange dimension. He felt like he was home for the first time in years. With a deep breath and a look around the car, he realized he was the only one awake. Part of him wondered how long they had been out. Last time, they were dead asleep for four days. 

Grant sat forward, turning around in his chair to look into the back rows of seats. Nick was out cold in the driver’s seat next to him. He saw the twins collapsed on each other in the backseat, and Terry slumped over the backseat. Kai and him made eye contact. Grant could see a fear in his eyes he hadn’t seen before.   
“Kai, you okay? What’s wrong, man?” He asked, unbuckling his seatbelt to be able to fully face him. 

“Where are we, Grant? This isn’t- this isn’t San Dimas. Literally where the fuck are we? Was this some running away scheme you dragged me into? I can’t- I can’t leave my mom, Grant I- I- I…” Grant knew that stim. Kai mimed strumming a guitar. Grant knew what that one, it was a stress stim. One Kai only did when he was trying to stave off anxiety. Grant quickly climbed out the car, going to the back door to pull Kai out too. If any of the other guys woke up, Grant didn’t want them eavesdropping on this. Not when Kai’s clearly going into some mix of sensory overload and anxiety. 

Grant gripped him by his upper arms, watching Kai clack together the kandi bracelets on his wrists he’d gotten from Lark a few days earlier.   
“Kai, Kai- Kai you know I would never do that to you. Nick was supposed to tell you what we were doing, did they tell you about all of this?” Kai wasn’t looking at Grant, he was looking at the trees, looking past Grant, looking at the ground, the car, the sky, anywhere but Grant. Not that Grant was gonna force him to, he remembers Kai telling him once that he hated looking at people directly, especially when he was already overwhelmed. Grant would let him look elsewhere, if it helped him feel safe. 

“No! Nick didn’t tell me  _ shit! _ I just got, ‘meet at the skatepark at one, we’re going on an adventure.’ so like, fuck me, I guess. GG, I can’t leave my mom- you- you don’t understand I- I’ve never been away from here for more than like three days. I don’t-” He pulled at his hair, making a small humming. 

“O-okay. I’ll talk to them about that. Can I hug you? I- can I hug you?” He waited for the nod, for consent he had learned to always ask for when he went to hug someone when they were having a moment like this from the years of him and his friends working each other throw the bad nights. He knew Lark hated being touched when he was going into overload. Lark liked to just crumple onto the floor and listen to music until it was over. Kai was not that way. Kai was already leaning most of his body weight into Grant. Grant carefully pulled Kai’s hands away from his hair, tucking them under his chin and holding Kai with a kind of care he usually only used on Paeden. 

Paeden and Kai were similar in some ways, when Grant thought about it. Paeden liked physical affection, it was easier for him to decipher than words. He liked when Grant would ruffle his hair or give him a hug before he left for school. Kai was like that, in a different way. Kai unapologetically took the physical comfort from Grant, always laying across him or leaning on him in more stressful environments. 

“Okay, KK, here’s what's happening. Time in this world passes really differently from home. We were in this place for like six months their time, and two days our time. But, the funky thing, when we left, it started passing equal to our time. But- Teej did a test and when he stayed in here for two days barely ten minutes passed in our world so it’s all fucked and we don’t get it, but point is; we’re in another dimension where we could find Jax, go on an adventure, and get back home by eight in the morning for our parents. And you’re a level one so you- a stiff breeze could kill you. Sorry, it’s true. Um, but like, Nick? Nick’s a level ten and can summon god, no I’m not even kidding when I say that. So, you’re good. We gotchu. I’m a fighter, so I can take a hit or two. You’re good. We’ve got you. Nothings gonna happen to you and you’ll be back home before you know it!” Grant glanced back to the car, where he could see Nick talking to the twins while Teej watched him and Kai with this big brother resolve he’d had since they adopted Cynthia two-ish years ago. 

“Grant, you don’t understand I-I’ve  _ never _ been away from my mom. Never.” Grant forced the van door closed again when he noticed Teej try to climb out. He held up a hand to him. Teej nodded and settled back into where Kai was sitting, turning to try and ignore that one of ‘his boys’ was clearly having a moment. 

“Kai, I get it. I get it. But- look, we can’t…. Okay, KK, it’s gonna be okay. We’ll be fine. You’ll be fine. What do you need? You want- you want a fidget? I keep some fidgets for Lark in the glovebox.” Grant offered, pulling back to let Kai take a breath. He felt the faint nod against his shoulder. “You like click-y things, right?” Another nod. Cool. Cool. 

Grant tapped on the window, watched as Nick rolled it down. 

“We all good, G-man?” 

“I need a click-y fidget, they’re all in the glovebox.” Grant replied, gesturing to the car vaguely and tightening his grip on Kai as he shuffled closer. The best part of being the same height, Grant could just cradle Kai and it not be uncomfortable for either. Grant felt Nick lay a cub in his hand. It was a fidget cube Terry had found somewhere, about five times the size of a regular fidget cube, like a cubic baseball. Lark loved the thing, because it was hard for him to lose it. Kai took it when Grant handed it to him, immediately beginning to click and clack at the buttons on it. Slowly, Grant felt the tension in Kai’s shoulders evaporate. 

“So we’re like- in the Dungeons and Dragons world now?” He asked, nudging his nose into the crook of Grant's neck. If Grant wasn’t in love with this sap before, all the little things like this really don’t help him not falling. His mind wandered to really how easy it was to hold Kai, he fit so comfortably in his arms that Grant wondered if some god made it that way intentionally. Like, maybe, in some life Kai really was his. 

“Uh, yeah. Essentially. I don’t know what class you are, but you’re level one.”   
“What are you?” 

“Me?” 

“Yeah.” 

“I’m a level 8 fighter, Purple Dragon to be specific about classes and whatnot.” Grant heard the sound of a dangerous hissing to his left. He noticed as the other four doodlers scrambled out the car and quickly collected their weapons, spells books, holy symbols, and whatever else they would need for a battle. The familiar rush of danger filled his heart as he let go of Kai, rushing past to get in the trunk of the car and- 

There they are. His battle-axe, his sword. His weapons. He strapped his sword sheath to his hip and tossed the axe to Kai. 

“Grant? What’s that? What’re we doing?” 

“A battle, obviously. We’ll let you get final blows on the hoard to get you some experience racked up. You know how to swing an axe?” Grant slammed shut the trunk, slinging his travelling bag over his shoulder and reorienting himself with the sword by doing a quick flourish before sheathing it. Oh how he missed the feeling of the blade in his hand. 

“Not really.” 

“Only one way to learn, come on!” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I spent ten whole hours doing character sheets for these god forsaken kids, and I still have two to do. These combat chapters are gonna kill me cause I'm playing one person DnD essentially. 
> 
> Anyway, Faerun time babyyyy


	9. the one where they meet snakes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> backstory time babes 
> 
> cw; fantasy violence against a hoard of basilisks, allusions to domestic violence, allusions to suicide.

Grant adjusted the handle of his axe in his hands, stepping in front of Kai to shield him from the small hoard of low level basilisks. It was so exhilarating to be back in his nice little corner of the world in Faerun. He loved it. The thrill of knowing battle would start within the next few moments. He was concerned about Kai’s hit points during the fights, hopefully Kai knew what feats and spells and whatever else he could do. If he didn’t, they were in for one hell of a ride this battle. He didn’t want to have to think about if he was about to lose one of the most consistent people in his life. But, with these basilisks being able to kill Kai in one hit, it seemed likely. And then he remembered his ace in the hole, their Undying Warlock. 

“Teej! You got any spells that’ll buff Kai to all hell?” Grant asked, propping his axe on his shoulder as he watched the massive reptiles slither closer. They hissed and spat, waiting for the humans to make the first move. He glanced to his right, watching Teej pull out his spells book and flip through. 

“Ha! I do! Forgot about this one.” Teej closed his book with one hand and dumped it back in his messenger bag. Grant nudged Kai over to Teej, watching as the taller touched Kai on the shoulder and drew some kind of sigil. “There. Death Ward. You can’t die for the next hour.” Teej gave Kai one of his signature smiles. Kai looked over himself and nodded, looking more than a bit uncomfortable with the current situation. 

“Do- do we have to kill those things?” He asked. Grant could see and hear his discomfort as he asked, the anxiety at the prospect of killing something. Kai had always been one hell of a pacifist, Grant never really understood why. Grant didn’t understand actively refusing to fight. The thrill of battle is what drove him in middle school. The special kind of rush that came when the enemy landed a good hit and you retaliate by ending their life. 

“Welcome to Faerun, baby.” Nick smirked, pulling their guitar pick earring out of their ear and turning it over in their hand. Grant knew what was about to happen, and he grinned in excitement. 

Nick raised the pick in the air, a devious smirk on their face, “GUESS WHO’S BACK, DIONYSUS! LIGHT ‘EM UP!” They yelled, watching a pillar of flame burst from the sky, Nick’s most powerful cantrip of Sacred Flame coming down on the largest of the five basilisks. “Thanks, old friend. Sorry I ghosted you for a couple years.” They tied the earring onto their bracelet, jingling it for a second to make sure it wasn’t gonna fall off. Grant’s fingers were itching to get into the fray, but he wanted to give everyone else a chance to get attacks in, cause once he goes in for the kill, these suckers are going down. 

Teej offered his spell books, launching off three blasts of purple magic in the directions of three different snakes. One retaliated, going for Teej, but was too damaged to attack him with any sort of accuracy. Lark slammed his wooden staff down in it’s head to deliver one hell of a blow to this basilisk’s head. It slammed against the ground, hissing in protest as Lark held down with his staff. 

“You wanna kill it off, Sparrow?” Lark looked over the other four basilisks, challenging them to stop the group of adventurers. The smallest of the hoard skittered back, hissing in frustration at the adventuring party. Lark hissed back, snickering when the monster seemed surprised. 

Sparrow grabbed the staff from Lark, Grant could see the traces of a cantrip being cast as the druidic twin brought the wooden staff down on the snake. He could guess it was one of Sparrow’s offensive cantrips judging from how royally fucked that snake looked after the blow. He looked over at Kai, who looked ready to vomit. He quickly brushed it off, if Kai started having another meltdown Teej would take care of him. Right now? Right now Grant wanted to do his class sake, the very thing he’d fallen in love with over and over through video games and Faerunian adventures. Grant Wilson wanted to fight.  He raised his axe, rushing forward and letting out a yell that was more of a gleeful laugh than anything as he brought the blade down once, twice, thrice, he slammed his axe into the basilisk, effectively decapitating it. Grant did a large swing with his axe, flinging off any blood that willed to fly and dropping it back onto his shoulder. 

“Oh how I missed being able to just go feral.” He mumbled, watching in mostly awe as Teej effortlessly fired off round after round of Eldritch blast until the next largest snake was downed. Oh how easy it was to kill such low level monsters. 

Two were left. One that seemed to be a baby, and one that was hellbent on revenge against the adventuring party. He looked back at Nick, watching at the kid set off Sacred Flame again, twice in a row to do double damage. The basilisk retaliated, going in to bite Lark, but Lark must’ve rolled one hell of a dexterity save, because he quickly shoved his bow staff into the creature's maw and slammed it into the ground, Sparrow throwing down their dagger into its eye to deal the final blow. 

All that remained was the smaller basilisk, watching the party with a resolve, clearly debating on if it should fight or to run. 

“You gotta at least attack the thing, Kai.” Nick commented, casting Hold Person to make sure they didn’t lose it. Grant looked to Kai, watching the inner turmoil in his eyes as he shifted the sword in his hands. 

“I- I can’t.” He whispered, looking the little thing in the eyes. Kai’s shoulders slumped when he realized what the rest of the Doodlers were demanding of him. What he would have to do on this trip. “I can’t hurt a living thing. Especially not a little one.” His voice sounded so small, but a kind of stubbornness in it Grant knew not to fight. The rest of the Doodlers, however, did not pick up on this. 

“Friend Kai, if you want to become stronger in the realm of Faerun, you must seek violence upon the unintelligent creatures, whether you wish to or not. I understand your struggle, as a fellow pacifist and a lovewolf, but it is needed to be done for the better of yourself and the party.” Sparrow said calmly, an unreadable expression as usual on their face. Grant tries to remember the last time he heard Sparrow say so much at once. He looked between Kai and Sparrow. He watched the flash of emotions in Kai’s eyes and then his eyes glazed over. And he vanished. 

The entire scene went blank, for just a moment. Just one horrifying moment. He looked around, seeing rolling fields with a gentle and warm sunlight. The first Kai realized that he was no longer wearing shoes, and that he felt the grass and dirt on the souls of his feet. He looked over himself, noticing he was not longer in the comfortable jeans and his favorite purple shirt, but rather a flowy shirt and black leggings. 

“Well, you’ve arrived sooner than I would’ve thought.” A young, feminine voice came from behind him. Kai doesn’t think he’s ever jumped harder as he turns around with a speed that knocked himself off balance. He tumbled into the ground and looked up to see a young girl, no older than thirteen, bright eyed and dark curly hair tied back in braids with a few sparkling gems mixed in. Her skin a beautiful shade that reminded Kai of the hot chocolate his mom used to brew during the cold winters when he was little. Her dress was a pale silk, flowing with a wind that Kai didn’t think was really there. 

“Who…. Are you?” He questioned, climbing back to his feet. He was a good few inches taller than her, and her round, childish features made her look like an elementary student. 

“I’m Hebe, goddess of youth. I wanna make a deal with you.” She gave a grin, a grin that made Kai think of the hours spent with his mom in the backyard chasing each other and laughing when one of them tripped over a tree root. 

“Um.. Why- why me?” Kai asked, watching amusement dance across her features. He felt like she looked much too little to be a goddess, but also it made perfect sense for the goddess of youth to look like she belonged in a class of fifth graders. 

“You’re the epitome of youth, Kai Levesque! Don’t tell me you’re  _ that  _ naive.” Hebe snorted, brushing a stray bang out of her eyes. “You, my young friend, are the epitome of youth. The very definition!” And that- that comment just confused Kai rather thoroughly. He looked at her, then down at himself, then back on her. He thought about his life, everything he’s experienced. 

“You’re joking, right?” There was amusement in his tone, lots of it. This lady had to be joking. She absolutely had to be. The twins he could see as youthful, maybe even Nick. But Kai? Kai was not youthful. 

“Do I need to show you?” She questioned, stepping forward and taking his hands. “Youth should not be mistaken for innocence or naivety, Mr. Levesque. It is much more complex than simply being young and dumb.” 

“Then- then what is youth?” 

“Youth is… Hard for mortals to comprehend. It’s being physically young, feeling able to do anything. It’s the feeling of fleeting joy and moving much too fast. Youth is growing up, learning what lies ahead and  _ fearing _ it. It is the grieve and despair that comes when you realize you’re no longer a child, no longer so innocent to the cruelty of the world outside the safety of your mother or father. It’s much deeper than the innocence of a child. It is the next generation using their young age to their advantage to change the world as we know it. Many uprisings in your Earthen history were begun by the youth refuting what their forefathers taught them. Did you know that?” She watched him, this admiration and love in her eyes that Kai had only seen in his mother before. This kind of silent support. 

“Then- then how am I youth?” 

“I’ll show you, if you’ll let me.” He thought for a moment, looking down at her frail hands in his. She was so tiny. He looked back to her, a patient smile greeting him at their eyes met once more. 

“I want to know.” 

_ Kai felt like he was four-years-old again. His mom had locked the both of them in the bathroom and pressed herself up against the door. Kai could hear the angry shouts of his father on the other side, hand slamming on the door over and over. Kai remembers this night. It was the night he learned that Daddy wasn’t nice.  _

_ “Mama- M-mama…” He beckoned, trying to usher her away from the door and to him. He was placed in the bathtub, Mama had told him not to leave it until she said he could. He wanted to listen to her. Another pound on the door and curse from the other side, Kai watched his mom flinch and let out a pitiful sob, tensing up even more to try and keep herself planted firm like a tree.  _

_ “Not now, baby, Mama’s busy. Just- just stay there, okay?” Her voice sounded strained, tired and scared. Kai had completely tuned out his father at this point, just watching his mother as her breath sped up and her crying got worse.  _

_ Kai doesn’t remember they sat locked in the bathroom, but at some point Mama was able to relax. He was ushered into her arms and she held him there, held him against her heart and whispered to him how much she loved him. They slept in the bathtub that night, huddled close with nothing but each other. He didn’t know if it was because Daddy said they had to, or becauseMama didn’t feel safe leaving the safe confines of the locked room with a first-floor window she could climb out of.  _

_ Kai waited impatiently as Mama unbuckled his carseat, picking up the six-year-old and setting him down on the ground. He grinned up at her, she smiled back with a tired look in her eye that Kai didn’t quite pick up on at the time.  _

_ “You ready to go see the new house, bébé?” Mama asked, taking Kai’s tiny hand in hers. She held on so tight, almost like she was scared of letting go. He gave her a dramatic nod, jumping in place for a moment. He looked over at a group of neighbor kids as they squealed and laughed, jumping on the trampoline in their backyard.  _

_ “Then can I go play?” He asked, wanting to go meet people, be friendly. But Mama had taught him to never talk to strangers, especially if they were strangers Mama didn’t know either. He stared up at her, expectant wide eyes. She sighed and shook her head, “No, honey. Not today.” She clutched him a little tighter, guiding both into the house to see what humble little place they’d be calling home for the next who knows how long. Kai went running in, a beaming grin on his face as he went and jumped on the mattress that lay on the floor of the master bedroom. The whole house was painfully bare, but it was what they managed to escape with. The bare necessities. _

_ Mama scooped Kai up and into her arms, grinning and falling back onto the mattress with him tucked against her chest, both laughing merrily as they tumbled. And, for the first time in maybe his whole life, Kai watched his mother relax. Truly and fully relaxed. Kai remembered how that night, it didn’t feel like his mom was holding a vigil all night, but instead slept peacefully. He remembered how excited he was when she let him run free in the fenced backyard. It wasn’t a nice fence by any means, it looked thrown together and like it could collapse at any moment, but it let Mama worry less about him.  _

Kai blinked a few times, looking to Hebe who watched him with expectancy in her eyes. He didn’t get it. Those were just memories. Repressed memories he wished he didn’t have to think about, the days he forced so deep into his subconscious he hated being forced to remember them now, but memories nonetheless. 

“Why are you showing me this? What does this have to do with anything?” He pulled a hand back from her to fidget with the ring on his neck. He felt overwhelmed, none of the pieces were clicking together and he just wanted something to make sense. 

“Kai Levesque… You really don’t see what it is I’m trying to show to you, are you?” She placed both hands on the one he was allowing her to hold, running her thumb over the back of his palm. 

“No. I-I don’t get it.” She nodded solemnly, thinking carefully over her words before she said them as she thought of how to illustrate this. 

“Youth is not simply about being youth _ ful, _ it’s also about having that innocence of being young being stolen from oneself.” She sent him back into the memories, using whatever goddess abilities she possessed to show him what she was saying. 

_ “No- no, no. Jaxton, Jaxton, shut your filthy mouth. You’re gonna look me in the eye and tell me Steve from Minecraft isn’t gay? He’s gay!” Grant refuted, gesturing to the mural he had on his wall as he spoke to his laptop, where Kai and Jax both sat on a video call. It was a familiar rhythm for the three of them, every night at six o’clock they got on a video call and talked until they all logged off.  _

_ “Look, Grant, I’m not saying Steve  _ wouldn’t  _ fuck a dude, I jsut think you’re one-hundo percent ignoring the obvious ship-ability of Alex and Steve!” Jaxton defended, snickering as he talked. His smile was a little lopsided, and a lot of purity. It broke the face he usually had of not caring about death and being all around a cool dude.  _

_ “That’s heteronormative as fuck, and I hate you for it, Jax. Like- like Alex and Steve would be the Grant’s Mom and Dad of video games.” Kai chimed in, laughing when Grant loudly voiced his agreement with Kai’s statements.  _

_ “Jax! Jax! You wanna know what happens when you try and put Gay Man Steve and Lesbian Icon Alex together? You get Steve falling for some random granola crunching, socks and Birkenstocks dude who smells like a dumpster fire and Alex falling for that Birkenstock wearing bitches husband and now- now their kid has these two disaster step brothers who commit arson.” Kai watched Grant toss down a shirt he was folding, making a ripple of laughter go through the call. “Steve Minecraft and Alex Minecraft are both gay and both icons, that’s my TEDtalk.” Grant leaned back into his couch, crossing his arms with this look of this discussion has now ended.  _

_ “Y’all are blind. Howzit feel to be wrong?” Jaxton was smug, Kai knew he was smug. And Kai wanted to smack him for it.  _

_ “Jax, my love, as much as-” Grant cut himself as the door to his room popped open, a scraggly man with messy blond hair and dirty glasses poking his head in. Current Kai knew this man as Henry Oak, but at the time Kai didn’t recognize him for a second.  _

_ “Grant, I know you’re talking to your friends, but dinner’s gonna be ready in a few and your father told me to let you know.” Grant looked from the computer to the man, and nodded.  _

_ “Yeah, okay, Thanks, Henry.” The door shut and Grant sighed, “Time to go deal with the family, I guess. See you guys later. Bye, love you.”  _

_ “Bye, GG! Love ya!”  _

_ “See ya Grant, love you.”  _

Kai knew where this memory was going. As innocuous as the jovial conversation seemed, Kai knew what came next. The events haunted him for so many months. He tried to pull away from the goddess who was showing him these memories. Showing him the most horrific moments from his brief time on his earth. The memories that kept him up at night. 

_ “Oh, shit. I gotta go pick up my little brother. Guess you’re coming with me, Kai.”  _ That smile. That smile is why Kai swears he didn’t plan to die that night. The styled blond ringlets, the way he had done his eyeliner that morning. How he acted like life was normal until the very last second. Jaxton couldn’t have been planning to end it all on that car ride, right? 

_ “Oh no, continue talking to my pal. What a nightmare.”  _ The humor in his voice shouldn’t have been there. He was so naive. So clueless to what was about to unfold. Kai watched, unable to end the memory.  _ Jaxton climbs into his car, Kai’s camera shows him a blurry messy version of the movement. He watches as Jaxton pops the phone into the GPS holder and starts the ignition.  _

_ “Someday soon I’ll be pulling into your driveway with this old boy, KK, you ready for that?”  _ A lie. Was he lying through his teeth? Did he mean to fulfill that promise? Was it all an accident? Was it an elaborate lie he kept up until those final moments or did he know he wasn’t gonna follow through? 

_ “Kai! Honey, I brought home dinner!” Mama called as she kicked open the front door. Kai couldn’t bring himself to reply with anything but a hoarse call for her. His phone laid somewhere across the room. He doesn’t really remember throwing it, but it’s been thrown. It’s probably broken. He doesn’t care. Everything feels so heavy.  _

_ “Kai? Baby, is someth-” His door opened. He still didn’t bring himself to move. His mom set the bag that Kai could presume was Cane’s judging from the smell and the fact Mama always bought Cane’s on Kai’s desk and moved to the bed, where Kai sat staring blankly at his bedspread as the tears just kept falling. He couldn’t stop shaking. Every muscle hurt from the constant unbearable tremble. The occasional ticking when it got really bad.  _

_ “Sweetheart, talk to me. What happened?” She sat across from him, wrapping her arm around his shoulders and carefully pulling him into a hug. She tried her best to console him, but Mama didn’t know what happened. He clutched at the back of her shirt, gripping tighter than he ever felt the need to before.  _

_ “He’s gone.” He mumbled, voice breaking as he pulled his mom as close he could. “Jaxton’s gone. They’re gone.” The words hurt so much worse to say out loud.  _

Kai couldn’t look back to the goddess once the painful memories ended. Instead he looked at his feet. He thought about those events more than he cared to admit. Thought about Jaxton more than what was probably healthy. 

“You’ve witnessed so much of the world, Kai. So much of the world at it’s very worst, and you will only witness more of it as your life continues. Yet you still stay youthful, you still strive for the joy of all the  _ good  _ out there, no matter how much the bad you experience.  _ That _ is youth, my friend. Seeing all the good and the bad, and choosing to stay kind and good through it all. Choosing to continue to have fun when you could just as easily give up on happiness. That is what I mean when I say you define my version of youth, Kai Levesque.” 

“Cool. Cool. What’s- what’s all of this for then?” He laughed nervously, pulling his hands back when she finally let go and wiping them on his pant legs. The whole world felt like it was becoming pressurized around him. 

“I want you to become one of my clerics, Kai.This is me offering my power to you, to use in battle and in adventuring.” He watched her step back. She gave him a quick bow, which felt very wrong considering the fact she’s literally a god, and Kai is well… Kai. 

“I- um… Yeah. Okay.” Kai knew a fair amount about clerics from his years of Dungeons and Dragons, and what the Earth world knew about Hebe from his stint as a Percy Jackson kid. 

“Wonderful! What would you like to be your holy symbol?” She clapped her hands together excitedly. Kai thought for a moment, but ultimately offered her the ring he kept hung around his neck. It felt right. Hebe took the ring carefully, whispering a blessing. Kai watched a splendid gold light engulf the two of them for just a second before she handed the ring back to Kai and he put it back around his neck, dropping it into his shirt to hide it from prying eyes. 

“I shall return you to your party now, be wise, my youthful friend.” 

It took Kai a minute to reorientate himself with his surroundings when he was snapped back. He looked over to Nick, then Grant, than TJ. One similarity; they were all staring at Nick’s phone. He didn’t get time to read the caller ID before Nick picked up. 

“Existence is very possibly a sham, you’ve received a call from Potentially Scam! What a pleasure to  _ finally _ meet you lot.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> she has arrived.


	10. the one where they get scammed

There was a collective groan that rippled through the Doodler’s at realizing who they were about to have to deal with. Nick themself had run into Potentially Scam a few times during their adventures with Walther. She was always annoying, speaking in rhymes and cryptic poems. Never being straight forward. Nick hated people who spoke like that, it was so annoying. Just say what you mean, ya know? 

“What do you want, Potentially?” Nick groaned, sitting down cause they knew this was gonna take awhile, Potentially never spoke with a reasonable amount of time or words in her responses. They looked over the rest of his party, watching the rest all slowly follow them to the ground. 

“Greetings and Salutations. I wished to welcome you to our little nation! I see you and the Doodlers are looking for someone special. I believe I may wish to offer you my help!” That’s what got Nick more than anything. Her rhyming wasn’t even  _ good _ rhyming. It pissed him off. Sometimes it wasn't even classified as rhyming, which really got him. 

“What? You think we’re weak little babies who need to be nannied, Scam?” They mocked, setting the phone down on full volume, speaker on, so the rest of the Doodlers could hear the among of bullshit this stupid tiefling was about to spew in their direction. Potentially Scam wasn't even a tiefling, she just liked shifting into a tiefling form. Which Nick really didn't see a difference in but Potentially always insisted there was one. Nick had seen her preferred appearance once before, only once. On accident. She’s had this weird grudge against him since and it was stupid as hell.

“I believe so, Nicolas Close. Actually, I do not believe, I  _ know.”  _ Nick wanted to knock her teeth in, her dumb teeth with that cute gap between her front teeth that showed when she gave that despicable mischievous grin. 

“Oh, a triplet. Spice it up, Scam.” They groaned, getting more and more fed up with this stupid being by the minute. 

“Now, shush it, dear friend. I fear you may come across a familiar evil, so mayhaps put your previous adventures under a close lens.” Nick could hear the squeak of her chair as she leaned back. They could almost picture her now, spinning around in her office taking some sort of sick glee from fucking them over. They couldn’t trust a thing she said, her name was fucking  _ Scam _ for god’s sake. Not to mention that she’s exactly like her father, a carbon copy of the bastard. 

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean, P.S?” Nick groaned, falling back into the grass in exasperation on this woman’s antics. There was a ripple of annoyance, concern, and flat out outrage at the message she was relaying. Teej was the first to talk. 

“Hey, hey, Potentially? Baby girl, please shut up with the cryptic shit. Is Willy alive again or not? We gotta kill some grandaddies?” Teej asked, leaning forward anxiously. Some shuffling and hushed voices sounded from Potentially’s end of the call, none loud enough to be made out. But once the sound of a door closing finished there was the most exasperated sigh Nick thinks they’ve heard. 

“Thank fuck, Dad’s gone. Jesus Christ, anyways, yeah boys. Boys? Boys. I got a lot of not so good info coming in from Oakvale and Meadowshade, so you are gonna sit down, shut up, and let good ol’ Potentially Scam inform you. Yeah?” The tension was almost palpable amongst the Doodlers. The fact Oakvale was coming back around was terrifying to them, especially to the twins. Nick remembers how hard those two worked to make sure Barry’s influence on agriculture there, the amount of laborious hours they spent undoing the magic and rebuilding that town for Autumn to govern and bring in real citizens. They could watch Sparrow bristle at the idea of their work crumbling to shambles in the brief time they weren’t here to maintain it. The kingdom they planned on returning to once they graduated high school could already be absolutely in shambles again. 

“Great, awesome, P.S, what’s going on with Oakvale?” Nick picked up their phone again, looking up to Sparrow and mouthing a word of encouragement to them. 

“I can’t tell you. Not how the Scam family works. But, I can tell you that-” Potentially paused, thinking over her words carefully before she said them. Debating which words should come out of her mouth next. “I need you six in two parties. Listen to every word I’m about to say. I need Nick, Grant, and Kai in Meadowshade. Terry Junior, Lark, Sparrow, you three need to go into the For Knights arena.” The group had this silent agreement to make sure phones were charged to full. Nick even noticed Grant and Teej checking their battery percentage to make sure they could all keep in contact. 

“Potentially, why should I listen to you?” Nick asked, a challenge in their voice they didn’t pull out often. The last time they think they’ve actually challenged someone was when they had gotten in a fight with Glenn a couple months ago. They had really gone for his throat then. 

“Because, I’m your only source of information. And if you want to survive this, and get back to your families by morning, you’re gonna fucking listen to me, Nicolas Close.” She shot back, just as much challenge in her voice. There was a tense beat of silence. 

“Nick, Potentially has yet to trick us, i doubt she would begin today.” Lark stated, picking at the grass at his feet to try and keep himself occupied as they sat here. 

“Listen to the Oak boy, Nicolas. It will serve you well to not cross me, I am much more powerful than you know.” Potentially warned. She felt so close, like at any moment she could leap from the phone and be here in person, but Nick knew better than to expect her too.

“Okay, okay. Fine. But you have to tell me what’s going on if you expect me to trust you, Scam.” 

“I cannot.” 

“You  _ can,  _ you just don’t want to.”

“No, I  _ cannot. _ I believe if your party members learn the information I have at my disposal from me, and not of their own accord, it will put  _ all of us  _ in a bad spot. Trust me, Nick. You all may be The Doodlers, but I fucking live here, I know every nook and cranny of this hell-scape of a dimension, and if we piss off the wrong guy, we’ll all go down.” Nick doesn’t think he’s ever heard Potentially sound so sure of something, so truthful. She always had this slight sound of lying or deceit to her tone, never full blanket honesty like right not. “Now, Nicolas, if you’ll stop being a stubborn mule, I am trying to provide you assistance. What’s the reason you’ve returned?” Nick handed the phone to Grant, knowing he’d have more information on what’s going on, given this was his quest and the rest of them were tagging along to make sure he didn’t beef it. 

“We’re looking for Jaxton Wull, about seventeen or eighteen. Human kid, looks like he’s about to fall asleep all the time.” Grant explained, twisting the cuff of his jeans around his hand anxiously. Potentially was quiet for a long moment, Nick swears he could hear typing on a computer. 

“I see, I’ll get on that, but right now- okay. There’s a spell book I need you boys to find. It’s the Dubois, it’s a prize in For Knights, which is why I need Terry and the twins in there. For Kai, Grant, and Nick. There’s someone in Meadowshade, I-I can’t say who. But he’s an old friend, you’ll know him when you see him. He has the gun an-” 

“Potentially, I don’t think we should trust you with a gun.” Grant interrupted. Kai snickered from behind him. 

“Grant, counterpoint; if we give Potentially a gun, our quest will be done in just a couple days.” Teej pointed out, “I say we get her the gun.” 

“The gun my dad had?” 

“Yes, Nicolas. Your father’s gun.”

* * *

The house was cold. Dark and quiet in a way Jeanne didn’t like. She couldn’t hear a second set of breathing next to her, nor really anything indicating that her son was in the house. It made her worry kick in, her anxiety. The kind of fear she had every day when Kai was little that if she took her eyes off of him for a second he’d vanish away and she’d never get him back. She rolled over in bed, feeling the empty space next to her for a moment. Surely, she’s just losing her mind and Kai was right next to her where he always was. Empty. Empty and  _ cold.  _ Not empty like he had just gotten up to go to the bathroom or go get water or something and was coming back. It’s been empty. Her heart rate spiked, spiked so high it felt like the world was ending as she sat up and looked around the dark apartment. The barely big enough to even house two people apartment. Jeanne could hear Clara running on her wheel in her cage, could hear Fritz snoring next to her. But she couldn’t hear her son. Couldn’t see her son. What time was it?

The phone’s screen glared at her as she powered it on, she blinked a few times before actually looking at the screen. 4:32. And Kai is  _ not in the apartment.  _ He would’ve told her if he was spending the night at someone’s house. Jeanne swears Kai was in bed next to her when they went to sleep last night. But- but he’s not here now. Where’s her son? Where’s her bébé? 

Maybe he went to Grant’s. He’s probably at Grant’s. Maybe something came up with Grant and he had to go over there and didn’t wake her up. Yeah. That’s it. She quickly went through her contact, mumbling a few French curses she wouldn't dare repeat if Kai was here before calling Darryl to check if that's where he'd gone. 

Jeanne knew there are so many possibilities of what Kai could be doing, that he’s probably fine somewhere. But, Jeanne Levesque is a  _ worrier.  _ She worries and she worries and she works herself into a panic, and she knows Kai isn’t the kind of kid to sneak out. She gives him no reason to. So, where is he now? Where did he go? Is he coming back? 

“Hey, Jeanne. Something up?” Darryl had obviously just woken up, she had  _ woken  _ him up. 

* * *

An awkward quiet hung over the three boys as they walked to the town of Meadowshade. Kai wasn’t really sure what was happening, but Grant and Nick both seemed to have some sort of unspoken rule to ignore the situation until they found themselves stuck in the midst of it. Kai tucked his hands in the pockets of his jeans and walked up next to Grant, trying his best to process what had happened in the last twenty four hours. 

They’d split from the twins and Terry about two hours ago, and had been walking in some uncharted path since. Nick seemed to know where they were going, playing some kind of playlist on their phone so the silence wasn’t too unbearable.  The good thing about the silence was that it left Kai to think. Think about all the chaos and actually process it instead of shoving it off into a corner for himself to explore later. The silence gave him enough time to himself to figure out if this all really was as absurd as it felt. Maybe Kai’s just gotten himself stuck in a really realistic dream. And, it only felt right he be the one to clarify what the fuck was happening in his life right now. 

“So, Meadowshade runs an orphan WWE, somehow your old friend got stuck in it after running away once, and now they have Glenn’s old magic gun and we have to go find them and retrieve it?” 

“Yep, you got it.” Grant nodded, hands tucked carelessly into his hoodie pocket as he stared ahead, bobbing his head to the beat of the Mother Mother song Nick had blasting. But, Kai still had so many questions. So many fears. So many irrationalities. Nothing made sense, whatsoever. Nothing clicked. Sure, he knew how DnD worked, he’d been playing for four years. But this  _ wasn’t  _ Dungeons and Dragons, it was some weird amalgamation of a universe that dared to call itself a Dungeons and Dragons-style world. This was like if a bunch of crazy college kids threw whatever crazy ideas they came up with into a campaign and called it a world. 

Kai found himself hooked his arm onto Grant’s. That was his one consistency, that Grant was with him. Grant was always with him. Even when they lived thousands of miles apart, they always had had each other right there. On the other end of the phone, just sitting there. He always had been. When Jax died, the first thing both of them did was call each other. They didn’t need words. They just needed each other there, just for a little while. Just long enough to know that the other was still alive, still there. When Kai came out, Grant was waiting on the other end of the phone to hear the news of how it went as soon as Kai could get to the phone to answer him. When Grant’s parents divorced, Kai vividly remembers sitting and just letting Grant cry for a few hours because that shit  _ hurt.  _

Grant pulled his hand out of his pocket, moving to hold onto Kai’s, giving a reassuring squeeze just to remind Kai that it was all okay. That he knew where they were and what they were doing, even if Kai didn’t. A predictable rhythm, like a symphony that played over and over again to a constantly changing audience. An audience that came and went as Kai and Grant edited the notes and added verses and phrases as they proved necessary. They’d rewritten this song so many times that it barely had the same melody, but it was still their piece of magic. 

“We should be in Meadowshade by nightfall, so we won’t have to set up a camp for the night, but we don’t have much cash left over from last time so we’ll have to do something to earn some gold.” Grant said, checking his phone, “If we enter in a couple UFC fights, we should easily get the win and-” Nick turned to look at him now, 

“No fucking way we’re doing UFC fights. I’m sure we could find an inn or something who needs a couple waiters and make a few quick bucks that way.” Grant opened his mouth to say something, but Nick was watching him with this kind of resolve that proved he was not taking suggestions this time around. Grant nodded and pursed his lips. 

‘Right, no UFC. Then, we get to Meadowshade, get the gun, go make a few quick bucks.” 

“Let me amend, Meadowshade, then cash, then gun.”

“Right.”


	11. the one where they added two birds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw; descriptions of falling from heights + presuming he's going to die in Paragraphs 4-7, mentions of vape/implied addiction in the final scene with Nick (but very brief, nothing really indepth)

The shuttle to the For Knights arena was not very fun. Teej had personally never experienced For Knights, and he doesn’t think the twins have either. He knows vaguely that this was Grant’s place, where he wound up after the whole slave trade fiasco that went on with the Lance. He also knew that it was pretty much Fortnite in Faerun, which seemed kind of fun on paper. He watched the twins, who were sitting and talking on a bench. He stood nearby. Many other players piled into the car as they were all shuttled to whatever zones they decided to drop in. Teej had let the twins choose which zone they dropped in, so he was just hanging out by the exit door until the two hopped up and told him it was time to hop out. 

He tapped nervously on the rail next to him, observing the other players they’d soon have to face. They had a plan. Unlike Grant, who had a strict “no murder” rule, neither Terry nor the twins cared about killing, and they all could do some dope magical shit. The plan was to get in there, wait out the slaughter of the weak people until there’s only a few zones left, then annihilate the final combatants and take the spellbook. 

Teej leaned against the wall behind him, crossing his arms and sitting in silence as he waited for the twins to claim it was their turn to hop off into the chasm of the For Knights arena. At least, that was the plan. But, the world had different plans. As the door opened, Teej felt the wind his back, the wind tugged at him and pulled him into a vortex he couldn’t escape. The door fell open. Terry hooked his heel on the edge and fell back. His hands hooked onto the sides in one last ditch to stay in the train. He felt the height at which they were up, and he knew he probably wouldn’t survive the fall. But how else would they get out though? 

Terry guesses his warlock abilities would come in handy, but the fear of heights was kicking in. He glanced down at how high up they were, and he immediately felt like puking. Terry Junior had sworn at a young age he would never go sky diving, but this was pretty fucking close to such an event. He spotted the twins hopping up to grab him from the corner of his eye heading to him to try and help him. His fingers slipped, and the floor that was precariously holding him up fell away. And he was falling. The wind whipped at his clothes as that cart fell further and further away from him and he plummeted toward the ground below. He felt his heart rate pick up as it settled in just how high up he was. 

Instincts kicked in and he worked to move himself to land on his feet. At least if he landed on his feet, maybe his undying ability would kick in and he’d wind up with a broken leg rather than a broken  _ everything.  _ Which sounded like a much better option than completely obliterating his body. 

The ground was creeping ever closer. Two hundred yards… One Hundred…. Fifty… 

His feet hit the ground with a sickening crunch of his left ankle, and he was down. The noise he made as the pain set in. The young warlock rolled himself over in the grass, digging his hands into the ground as he bit his lip in an poor attempt to suppress his scream as his ankle throbbed and shot bullets of horrific agony through him. The world was going white, no noise around him registering over the feeling of what was definitely a broken ankle. 

He could make out the faint noises of people talking around him, and he partially accepted that these For Knights bastards are gonna take advantage of this kid being downed by one measly busted ankle and he was a goner. Terry felt a hand on his ankle and as his vision cleared he saw the figure of someone standing over him, talking to someone else. They were a tall drow, ears sloped down and tinted black at the tips. They wore a black blouse and stained, fitted pants with muddied boots. It didn’t seem like they had any armor, but that war hammer on their back proved they at least some had defense in this death game. 

The drow looked Teej in the eyes, looking bored and already done with this whole affair. “You got teammates we need to track down?” They asked, blunt and clearly just wanting to get on with the game. 

“ _ Krow,  _ don’t be rude. The person’s hurt! You need a healing potion, No-Name?” A second voice chimed in, Teej propped himself up on his elbows to look at them. A half elf, crouched next to his ankle. This was the person who had touched it. Their skin tone reminded him of wet sand on a beach, especially considering they had this faint ocean blue glow to their skin, probably from the elven blood. They had their left leg stretched out in front of them, and Teej could tell the ankle was angled in a way that wasn't quite normal. This character had themself propped up on a forearm crutch, another laid in the dirt next to them. 

“Ah- um… Yeah, that’d be great. If you guys have one- that you’d be willing to give me, of course.” He felt awkward and unsure. Grant had told him most of the teens in For Knights just helped each other out, Terry had heard more than his fair share of stories about the Hotties. But, actually experiencing a couple of strangers in a game where you’re supposed to  _ kill each other  _ was kind of bonkers. It felt like he was Katniss, and these two random kids were Rue and Peta. 

“Of course! Hold on, let me-” The half-elf grabbed the other crutch and stood back up, making their way over to ‘Krow’ who rolled their eyes with this bemused look on their face and propped open their bag of holding to let them rummage through it. 

“I’m Kestrel, by the way. Fey/fer. Xyr Krow, xe/xem.”   
“Oh, um… Terry Junior, he/him. Most people just call me Teej, though.” He shifted to actually be sitting up, the messed up ankle splayed out in front of him and his actual uninjured leg brought in closer to make him more comfortable. Kestrel nodded and hummed a bit, pulling out a bottle full of a reddish-pink liquid and handing it to Terry. 

“I think that’s a weaker level one, but it’s what we got. What class are you? I’m a rogue, and Krow is a ranger. We lost xyr bow though.” Terry was just now noticing the stark difference between these two characters. Krow was in mostly muted colored, blacks and greys and brown boots. Kestrel? Kestrel looked like someone took as many bright colors as they could find and dumped it on fer. It was an interesting dynamic. Like Lark and Nick used to be, when Nick tried to be emo in eighth grade. 

Terry took the bottle from Kestrel, popping off the cap and drinking it efficiently as he could. The familiar warmth came into his bones, sending a tingling electric feeling through him as his ankle was fixed right back to where it was before his fall. His hands were still shaking from the fear of the fact he easily would’ve just died if he was home and not in Faerun with that god awful contract with ‘Terry Senior.’ 

“I’m uh- I’m a warlock.” He felt sheepish admitting it, he knew warlocks had a bad rep. He regrets becoming a warlock in all honesty, he was so stupid back in that first run through Faerun. 

“Oh funky! Who’s your patron?” Kestrel offered him a hand to help him up, which he was honestly a little grateful for as he pulled himself up. Krow was close to his height… Ish. He’d say around 5’11 or 6’0 even. Kestrel… He couldn’t really tell how tall fey were, since the whole leaning on feir crutches thing gave fer a natural hunch, fey were somewhere a good few inches shorter, though. 

“You wouldn’t know him, and thanks. So, what are you guys doing in For Knights?” 

“Later. Do you have a party?” Krow drummed xyr fingers on xyr arms, seeming impatient. “Cause, we need to get you back to whoever they are, cause Kes and I have places to be.” Xe seemed stressed, pulled tight in every way. 

“Right! Yeah. You got any party members?” Kestrel seemed restless, but in a different way than Krow. Restless in the way fey just wanted to go, to move and experience life. 

“Oh- um… Yeah. A set of half-elf twins, a monk and a druid. Lark and Sparrow Oak-Garcia?” Krow and Kestrel both though for a minute, and ultimately looked at him like he had something wrong. 

“You said they’re last name is Oak-Garcia?” Krow asked, stepping just a tad closer. “And you’re Terry Junior?” If Terry’s being honest, he felt a bit threatened. Krow was a pretty intimidating person, like how sometimes Terry himself would use his height to intimidate people when they had to get it. 

“Um… Yeah. Terry Harker.” He nodded to further solidify what he had said, not wanting it to seem like he was coming up with a lie on the spot. 

“You’re a Doodler.” It was an accusation, a kind of venom behind xyr words that made Terry’s skin crawl. He hated when people got mad at him, and now Krow was definitely mad at him. He swallowed down the lump in his throat and nodded, 

“Yeah. I’m a Doodler.” Krow grabbed his collar and yanked him down so they were eye level. There a tense beat of silence, Krow staring into his eyes. 

“Krow, don’t.” Kestrel warned, a bit stiffer than fey were before. A bit more on edge. Terry knew he had just fired some kind of bullet, and it hit. 

“You better tell me what the fuck you bastards are doing back here. Where are those dads? Are they here?” There was an offense, a rising tension. Honestly, Terry should’ve expected this. The dad royally screwed over this entire dimension in multiple ways, he should’ve expected some people who would hear his name and want to pulverise him. These people had no reason to cater to Terry just because Terry had done some cool magic shit back in the eighth grade. 

“The dads don’t even know we’re here. We’re looking for someone. It’s me and the twins. That’s it.” He didn’t move to try and shove this guy off him. There was no reason to. Krow wasn’t  _ harming  _ Terry, and plus he really couldn’t blame the guy for having some kind of grudge against the Doodlers. 

“Krow, leave him alone.” Kestrel had this warning in their tone, any happy-go-lucky attitude they had before evaporated. That bubbly attitude dropped for just a moment to drag Krow back down to earth. 

“But Kes-” 

“ _ Leave it,  _ Krow. Back down.” Krow huffed and let Teej go, shoving him away from xyr. 

“You’re on thin ice,  _ Doodler.”  _ Now, under any normal circumstances, Terry should probably feel a little bit threatened. But his only thought right now is, ‘eh, that’s valid.’ Because, honestly, what else is he gonna say? No people shouldn’t hate his stepdad and his friends who caused absolute mayhem and killed hundreds? Hell no. that’s some ‘blue lives matter’ type shit, and Teej doesn’t fuck with that. 

Kestrel gave him an apologetic smile as Krow turned xyr back and began walking the other way. 

“Sorry- xe uh… Don’t like the Doodlers very much.” Kestrel said, awkwardly gesturing for Teej to follow them both. 

\---------------------------

Grant usually wasn’t a very affectionate person. He used to hate touch, but between Paeden, Kai, and Nick, he’s learned to let people hang off of him. It was becoming a sort of comfort now, if he’s being totally honest. Like right now, Kai is holding his hand and hugging onto his arm with his head on Grant’s shoulder as they walked, which clearly made him feel much more safe and comfortable than just walking next to Grant. 

“You doing okay?” Grant asked, glancing down at Kai who seemed pretty thoroughly spaced out at this point. Kai adjusted his head, not really responding more than humming.That was a good enough for Grant. Instead of forcing out more words when he could already tell kai was getting overwhelmed and scared, he looked at Nick, 

“Hey- hey Nick, can I put on a playlist?” Grant asked, reaching for his phone. One fact Grant remembered Kai telling him was that unfamiliar music gave him anxiety. So, he figured that he could hunt down Kai’s playlist on Spotify, which wasn’t hard when the Doodlers Discord had a channel with all their playlists linked so they can mooch off each other’s music tastes. 

With a click of one playlist titled, ‘settle down there, dysphoria’ on Kai’s account, hitting shuffle and raising the volume so it was on full blast. He could feel a sense of ease go over Kai once the playlist started, the comfort of something familiar finally helping him relax.   
“We’re about twenty minutes out from Meadowshade, so we get there, get an inn for the night. Then, tomorrow we start looking for… Whoever it is Potentially wants us to find.” Nick chimed in, blatantly looking anywhere but at Kai and Grant having this little moment. 

Honestly, Nick doesn’t know what they expected. They  _ knew  _ Grant was head over heels for the guy, and Kai’s feelings weren’t exactly totally platonic either. They really should’ve expected to third wheel on this adventure. It still fucking sucked though, because, Nick thinks they’ve found Grant attractive about since Yeet Bigly, and that’s one long ass time. Seeing Grant go fucking wild in battle with those snakes? Did not do a damn thing to help Nick’s bisexual brain stop crushing on him, he’ll tell you that much. In other news, Nick was now acutely aware that he forgot his vape pen at home. And he was very much  _ regretting _ that forgetfulness now.

He drummed his fingers on his thigh as they kept walking, using the music as distraction from the fact he definitely needed hit. He sighed and sped up a bit, wanting to ignore the sappiness of the ‘young and happy not-really-a-couple’ next to him and just get all of this  _ bullshit _ over with. It’s bad enough they’re back in Faerun, it’s even worse that they’re back in Faerun and Nick has to watch these blokes be totally in love, while he’s here pining. Fuck, Nick kind of just wants to say fuck this whole adventure and go the fuck home, but that wouldn’t be a cool thing to do. So, instead, he’ll suffer. Silently wishing Grant would quit being an oblivious piece of shit and actually notice that Nick had been flirting with him all of these years. He looked back at the two, choking down his frustration at the fact they were all over each other. Like always. 

“You guys go find whoever it is we’re looking for, Potentially said you’d know him when you saw him so whatever. I’m gonna go get an in.” because Nick simply could not sit with these fucks for one more second. Not even one. He waited for the nod from Grant and fucking scrammed. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. if you have negative views on Neo pronouns. No you don't <3   
> 2\. Kestrel and Krow are both very new territory for me in character writing (by that I mean, i've literally never written a disabled character before and while I feel very confident about the amount of research i put in Kestrel before starting this chapter, I know I'm not infallable), and so if I screw anything up with them (i.e pronouns or general portrayal regarding their dynamic as the story progresses with them),,,, please tell me i beg of you. I want the characters in this story to be well represented and good portrayals of the people groups they're apart of, especially because with disabled characters the bar is on the fucking floor, and it shouldn't have to be


	12. the one where jeanne is the main character

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw; mentions of domestic violence, past abuse and trauma, depictions of flashbacks. These trigger warnings all happen in the second second scene, beginning with Jeanne + the dads + moms in Darryl's living room. 
> 
> general content warning for the backstory of Kai and Jeanne, because that will be explored very in depth over the next arc. 
> 
> Chapter updates will probably come ungodly fast for the next month, since I'm using Kai as my NaNoWriMo and I like to post chapters as soon as I get them done rather than keeping a schedule

On the list of things Grant expected in Faerun, the absolute never ending list of ground they could’ve covered and endless possibilities, running into his  _ ex-boyfriend  _ in an orphan fighting arena that some random scam caller chick led him to was not on the list. But, here they are, he guessed. 

It was unmistakable, all right. Yeet Bigly was in the arena, fist fighting some other guy who looked like he didn’t stand a single chance in this arena. Yeet was… Well, Yeet. Yeet didn’t look much different from how he used to look. He looked older, sure. They all did, but he was still Yeet Bigly. He still had his eyepatch over the robotic eye, still had his busted old skateboard leaned against the edge of the rink. Still had the bulky bracelets and ripped up clothes that he made look cool. He was still a good few inches taller than Grant, and it instantly reminded him that  _ oh yeah, this kid was my gay awakening.  _

The panic upon coming across Yeet must’ve been obvious on Grant’s face, because Kai leaned toward him to be able to be heard over the yelling and cheering of audience members. 

“Who’s that?” He asked, stepping a bit away from Grant and letting go of his hand. Grant wished he hadn’t, but Kai did grow up in the south where being openly affectionate as members of the same sex was heavily frowned upon. 

“My ex.” Grant said back, tucking his hands into his pants pockets. When Yeet looked at him, he didn’t look away. He didn’t back down. Even if every bone in his body was yelling at him to do so, so get the fuck outta here because this was only going to end badly. He stayed. Planted like a tree and unreadable as Yeet made eye contact with him across the tavern after the fight. And Yeet… smiled? He smiled. 

“Yo! Grant!” He grabbed his board and climbed out of the ring and jogged over. He looked… happy to see Grant, which was baffling in so many ways. Don’t get Grant wrong, him and Yeet didn’t end badly. It was more of an understanding that they couldn’t make a relationship work when they’re in different dimensions and can’t contact each other. This is the reason why when Yeet offered a hug, Grant gladly gave it to him. Even if those feelings from his first run through Faerun no longer lingered, Yeet was still an old friend that he went on wonderful adventures with together and seeing he was okay was a kind of relief Grant couldn’t describe.

“What’re you doing in Faerun? Something happen? You’re not stuck here are you? If you need help i could-” 

“No, nothing like that, Yeet. I’m here willingly this time. ‘M looking for someone. Potentially sent me your way. I need Glenn’s gun.” Grant absolutely did not miss how kai just got a little closer to him, nor how he seemed more protective the second Yeet started being cordial. It made his heart flutter in a way it hadn’t in a long time. 

“Glenn’s gun? Oh, uhm.. Yeah, I know where that is. Wait- he’s- this white kid’s new, right?” Yeet glanced at Kai, then back to Grant and kind of tilted his head. He used to do that all the time. 

“Yeah! He’s new. This is Kai, he’s an old friend.” Grant explained, letting Kai lock their hands together again (neither really could decide if they preferred holding hands or just standing next to each other). Yeet nodded, adjusting jacket a little bit and nodding. 

“Cool. Cool. My name’s Yeet Bigly. Grant and I go way back.” Kai nodded, licking his lips and brushing his hair out of his eyes. 

“C-cool. Epic. I’m- um. We should- we should go get that gun, right?” 

* * *

Jeanne bounced her leg anxiously, head in her hands as she listened to Darryl behind her. At this point, all the parents were crowded in Darryl’s living room after realizing  _ all  _ of their kids are missing. Glenn was on the couch next to Jeanne, looking concerned for what she thinks is the first time. Henry had his head in Glenn’s lap and his feet in Mercedes’, none saying a word. Ron was sitting cross-legged on the floor across the room, Samantha sitting in a chair next to him whilst petting his head. Carol was trying to force Darryl to sit down, which he was clearly refusing to do. And, Paeden was on the coffee table. 

“Dads, you don’t they would’ve-”

“No, Glenn! That’s absolutely stupid. You think my boy would be that dumb?”

“Glenn has a point, my darling Darryl, they very well could have-”

“I- I don’t think Terry would-would’ve uh… Would’ve gone back. That- that doesn’t sound like him.” 

“I agree with Ron, Darryl. If that was as bad as I got from the phone calls they wouldn’t of-”

“Especially not with Kai, right?” 

“Bros, I- I don’t think we should rule out of the possibility of them going there. You know they all had a bit of fun, a lot of trauma, but they- I mean, at least Nick and Grant, they had fun.” A tense silence settled over all of them. As much as Jeanne wanted to ask what they were talking about, she didn’t have enough grip on reality to actually say anything. This wasn’t like her boy. This wasn’t like him at all. Even if he didn’t verbally tell her where he was going, she always got a text or a note. Not- not vanishing into the night without a word. 

The couch dipped as Carol came and took a seat next to her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. They were mildly friends, the kind of friendship you get when you work as someone’s secretary in a law firm for four months. The kind of friend that knew half of Jeanne’s shit because the amount of times she’d have episodes at work from cases being a little too similar to what she had to sort out with Kai when he was little was too many to not tell Carol all of it. 

“We’ll track him down, Jeanne. Don’t you worry.” Carol assured, giving Jeanne this motherly hug that brought a good sense of comfort. 

“Paeden- Paedster. You said you ran into Grant before he left, right? Last night?” Darryl asked, leaning on the couch cushion behind Jeanne. She felt so very small. She felt twenty-two again, and the fact Darryl  _ sounded  _ like him when he got serious was no help. Jeanne was losing it, losing her grip on reality and falling down a rabbit hole so fast her head was spinning. The only difference between today and what finally pushed Jeanne to leave nine years ago was simple; this time she had friends to help her find Kai. 

“Yes, sir. He told me was going to go for a walk! And I had no reason to doubt such words, since he said he was having insomnia and needed to clear his head, so I allowed him to go.” Paeden nodded his head as he talked, ripping up a napkin. Paeden had a strange way of talking, in Jeanne’s opinion. Like he wasn’t really familiar with how people actually used English and was saying what he felt English should be instead. 

Jeanne let herself fall into Carol just a little more, trying to stop her hands from shaking but at this point it was useless. She set her glasses down on the table and shut her eyes, attempting to level her breathing. The voices around here faded to static and- 

_ “Where is my kid, Johnathon?” She was twenty-four. Johnathon had put [Kai] up somewhere, but wouldn't tell her jack shit about where [he] was. “Just tell me where [he] is so i can go pick him up. You can’t- you can’t keep my own [son] from me.” She felt the tears in her eyes, and she was already prepared for the chastising that will come with them. Jeanne just wanted to grab her baby and get out of this hellhole. He’s onto her, she knows he is. He knows she’s trying to escape him. This is his final powerplay before she goes. Whether that’s by running away, or by dying, Jeanne can’t know until it happens.  _

_ “Why’s it matter, my dear? [He’s] fine, I promise. Let’s just enjoy our night and-” He reached for her. His fingers on her arm felt like hot coals, burning her as she shoved him away. She wasn’t doing this tonight. She was so sick of rolling over and being complacent.  _

_ Jeanne stifled a sob, making a conscious effort to make herself seem much smaller to him. If she looked small and frail, he’d pity her. Or it’d piss him off. Either way, she knew how to play the cards. Six years of manipulation tends to let the victim learn how the manipulator ticks.  _

_ “I just want my baby home. Please, Papillon.” She pleaded, brain racking itself with all the predictable reactions he’s going to have. a) he’ll hit her and tell her to quit being so dramatic, b) he’ll try to baby her and usher her to bed, or c) try to change the subject.  _

_ “Now, come on, [Jeanne], don’t be like that. [He’ll] be home soon, let’s just go to bed and-” He went with b. Calculate, Jeanne.  _

Carol was cradling Jeanne, even if Jeanne seemed like she didn’t want to be. She’d seen this before. Jeanne would go rigid and glassy-eyed and be on a whole other plain of reality to the rest of the room for a minute. Henry had already guessed what was happening and went to get Jeanne a cup of tea, Darryl running to get one of their comfiest blankets. Jeanne reminded Carol a lot of her own eldest daughter, who honestly wasn’t too much younger than her. Jackie- god, Jackie was twenty-three now. It’s crazy how fast time passes. 

_ She had made a mistake. Her calculations were wrong. She found herself crowded against the well, staring into those cold eyes. Jeanne thinks one day, long ago, they held love. Now they held nothing. It was a battle. A battle to see who would make the first move. A coin being flipped to decide the next scene in this game of cat and mouse. If the cat would pounce or if the mouse would run.  _

_ “Where is [he]?” She tried one last time, knowing with everyone in her body that-  _

Carol was rubbing circles on her back, a blanket being pulled around her shoulders. She registered the trembling in her hands before anything. Then she registered that he wasn’t here. Henry crouched in front of her, offering her tea. It still took her a moment to re-equate herself with her fingers as she took the cup, watching the water ripple with quivering in her hands as she pulled it to her. She mumbled a thanks to Henry… And an apology. 

“Don’t apologize, Jeanne. I get it.” Henry held her hands still for a second, just to make sure she had a good grip on the mug before letting go. “The only people here who I think haven't personally experienced panic attacks or flashbacks are Mercedes and Samantha, but they’re married to me and Ron, so heavens know they’ve witnessed a few. Are you okay?” he moved to take his spot back on the couch between Mercedes and Glenn. 

“I-I think…” She mumbled, smelling the tea Henry had handed to her and feeling a bit of ease from the familiarity of it. Jeanne noted Carol was still rubbing her back and holding onto her. Carol was a natural born mother, it’s no shock she wound up with five kids that are legally hers and a whole menagerie of kids who aren’t. 

“Do you know what triggered it?” Glenn asked for his contribution to ‘peopling’ for today. He sat one leg thrown haphazardly over Henry and the other folded in toward him. 

“Um- I… Darryl sounded- sounded like um.. Like him.” As much as Jeanne wanted to say who he was, even after all these years of coping and therapy, she still couldn’t bring herself to say his name. But, the other parents seemed to accept that as an answer, not prying further. “Henry you- you said you all had experience with flashbacks and stuff?” 

“Of course! I- wait, permission to talk about it, fellow dads?” Henry asked, looking between the three. Ron shrugged, Darryl waved his hand, and Glenn mumbled a “granted.” The moms all nodded toward each other in this silent agreement. 

“Henry, while you get into all of that, I’m going to go see if I can get a hold of any of the kids.” Carol said, quickly checking with Jeanne that it was okay she left before standing up and going into the other room. Jeanne moved to sit criss-crossed, letting herself feel like she was being enveloped by the blanket someone had laid on her. 

“Of course, Carol! Let us know who you manage to get. Anyways, so, Jeanne.” At this point, most everyone except Jeanne and Samantha were somehow leaning on each other on the couch. Henry sitting with Mercedes’ arm wrapped around his shoulders and Glenn’s legs in his lap, Ron sitting once again on the floor in front of Glenn, letting Glenn toy around with his collar. Darryl sitting in the corner of the l-shaped couch, Glenn using his thigh as a makeshift pillow. It felt more like something a group of college kids would do and not grown adults, but Jeanne enjoyed knowing that these people felt comfortable enough with each other to just create a pile of limbs and bodies together like that. 

“So, essentially, us dads and the kids went through some… some very traumatic things, I won’t get too deep into it because it’s a lot to try and explain. But, our- well, mine, Ron’s, and Glenn’s fathers kidnapped our boys about four years ago, and a lot of- forgive my language, but a lot of shit in that span of time. We couldn’t get outside help, for some reasons I won't get into. But, we had to go find them ourselves, and it was rough. My dad was a cult leader, horrendous guy. My mom wanted me to murder him myself. Of course I didn't. But- but I thought about it. Ron’s- Ron’s was just every kind of bad. If you can think of a kind of abuse or manipulation, he probably used it on Ron at some point in life. And Bill-” Henry was cut off, looking at Glenn as he quickly sat up. 

“We’re not talking about Bill.” Glenn said quickly before laying back down and clearly making it known that was the end of that conversation. 

* * *

After attempting to call both twins, Grant, and Terry, Carol had finally managed to get Nick to pick up the phone. By the time she heard the actual answer of the phone, she was ready to strangle all of them. 

“Where in the hell are you? Jeanne’s worried sick, I can see Henry trying not to panic, and fucking- is my son with you?” She ran the heel of her palms over the front of her pants, pacing impatiently. 

“Um- no. He’s somewhere else. But, we are in Faerun. We have Kai. How long has it been in your time?” 

“It’s nine. Why are you in Faerun? What the fuck do you boys think you’re doing? You better get back together and get your asses home or i swear to god Nicolas-” 

“Look, Mo- Carol. We’re looking for someone- I don’t. I’ll see if I can maybe get the party back together, I don't know when we’ll be home. That also means our time is synced again… That’s- not good. Okay. Sorry we freaked you guys out, we thought time would be all jacked again.” 

“YOU DIDN’T THINK TO LEAVE A NOTE THAT YOU WERE IN FAERUN? OR TAKE ONE OF YOUR FATHERS WITH YOU?” She wasn’t angry, that for damned sure. She was furious that these teenagers thought they could go on some Faerunian quest without an adult. Without telling the adults. “Nicolas Morgan-” 

“I gotta go. Potentially’s calling me, she’s got info. We’ll be home soon, Carol. Promise.” The line went dead and Carol was left fuming in the closet. 

Carol huffed as Nick hung up the phone , stuffing it back into her pocket and exiting the room she’d hidden away in. 

“Yep, they’re exactly where Glenn said they were  _ and  _ they split up.” She groaned, sitting back down next to Jeanne. “So, this is your problem now, dads.”

* * *

Jeanne was just settling into the couch when the front door cracked open. She looked over and smiled when she saw them. They waved awkwardly and took a seat next to her. The apartment felt so much more homely with some else there, and Jeanne was never one for being alone. 

“Did you find him yet?’ Enne asked, quickly pulling Jeanne under their arm and combing fingers through her ginger curls. They had such a comforting presence. 

Enne was an interesting character in Jeanne's life to say the least. She had met them at some work, actually. They were being overseen as a possible guardian for a runaway kid in their class that had already been staying with them for a while. Ultimately, the little girl was sent to a proper foster, but Jeanne personally thinks that was more due to the judge being transphobic than Enne actually being an unfit caretaker. They’d known each other for three months now, and if jeanne said she wasn’t captivated by them, she’d absolutely be lying through her teeth. She was never one to think she’d fall for a femme presenting person, but here she is. Kai had no idea Enne even existed yet, she wasn’t sure her son was ready to let his mom back out into the world of romance. 

“We- we have a rough estimate. They think he’ll be home by tomorrow. Then he’s gonna be fucking grounded until the next century.” She sighed, letting herself curl herself up on their side and just feel cared for for just a moment. 

It only took twenty minutes for Jeanne to be laying pretty much on top of Enne on the couch as they watched some cheesy old movie. It was a much needed form of therapy after the absolute stress of the past ten hours of her life. And the way Enne held her… It was so foreign to her. It wasn’t overbearing, or intimidating. It wasn’t anything like how he had held her. No… They just effortlessly kept her in their arms, just happy to have her close. Just happy to cradle her. She never felt trapped when she was with them, never felt scared or in danger. It was uncharted territory, and while it was an absolutely terrifying new adventure at times, it was one she finally felt ready to take. 

Jeanne ran her fingers through Enne’s dark curls, noting how the corners of their mouth were ever so slightly turned up. She found herself smiling just looking at them. It was such a welcomed kind of unfamiliarity, this domestic kind of just being there. In arm's length when Jeanne really needed it. 

“What? Is there something on my face?” Enne blurted once they realized Jeanne was very intensely just watching them. The young woman snorted and hid her face in the crook of their neck, making it that much easier to wrap her up in their arms and cradle her there. One lesson Enne learned early on in cuddling Jeanne was to never hold too tight and keep a loose enough grip that when she did push away inevitably it was almost too easy to push them away.

“No, you’re just easy on the eyes is all.” They wanted to tell her that they loved her, wanted her to know that even if the two of them weren’t necessarily together at the moment, that they adored her and wanted her to receive nothing but the world. That she deserved nothing else, because she really didn’t deserve anything less than absolutely everything. But, they couldn’t. She made it clear that she didn’t feel comfortable being told things like that at this point, that she really only felt okay saying she loved her son and she didn’t want to feel pressured to say it back. Enne had always assured her they never expected her to say it back until she felt ready to, but they also understood the kind of pressure that came with someone saying they loved you. 

“Hm… I see. That means I’m free to stare at you?” They loved watching her cheeks redden as the words set in. 

“Pfft- shut it.” She sat up off of them, standing up to get something out of the fridge. They noted how they felt significantly colder once she left. Maybe that’s from body heat, or maybe it’s placebo. They may never know.   
Jeanne grabbed an Ale-8 out of the fridge and a Dr. Pepper for Enne. She passed them the soda and settled to sit next to them this time instead of on top of them. 

“Don’t tell Kai I stole one of his ale-8’s. He’ll maul me.” Jeanne snickered, popping off the bottle top and taking a drink. 

“I mean, I’ll only put you on blast if you let me meet the kid.” 

“Hm… Maybe someday soon. I just don’t want him to think I’m trying to replace him with you. It’s always just been Kai and Jeanne against the world.” 

“I get that, but, I feel like he’ll feel more betrayed if you hide me from him much longer. You’d be upset if he held a partner from you for months, right?” 

“Yeah, you’re right. I’ll- I’ll talk to him about it.” 

“Whenever he gets home, that is.”

“Psh, yeah. Darryl said he’s got it though, so I guess I’m not nearly as panicked as I was this morning.” 

“I’m glad. I’m sure he’s just pulling some teen angst bullshit, though. He’ll be fine.” 

“Yeah, maybe.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> did I just introduce two new characters last chapter? yes. Did i introduce another new nonbinary character this chapter anyway? Absolutely.
> 
> I'm a platonic simp for Enne, I talk about them all the time. They're what Jeanne deserves.


	13. the one where shit goes down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw; mentions of nicotine use/withdrawal in the scenes with Nick, mention of a transphobia + slur use in the third scene during the paragraph after kai's texts. 
> 
> The last scene in the chapter generally just has a very overwhelmed feeling to it, a lot of stress and feels a lot heavier than I meant it to. But, it feels right to have Kai just utterly overwhelmed and needing a minute to just emote at the end of this chapter

Kai found himself sitting around a table with Yeet and Grant, the two discussing something he genuinely knew nothing about whatsoever. He had his hand on Grant’s, as usual. One part because of his anxiety and two parts because Kai did not like the fact they were sitting here plotting with his ex-boyfriend (who was admittedly very hot). Something about this tavern also felt very hostile and Kai absolutely hated it.

“The gun’s all the way in Ravenloft, me- me n Killa lost it during a fight once a while back. I’m fine to help you guys track it back down but Grant we-” Yeet had his eye patch sitting on the table, hair falling in front of whatever he was hiding with that eye.

“Cool, cool. We’ll need to level up Kai a few before e make it up to Ravenloft, you can tag along if you want and we’ll meet up with the boys back at-”

“Grant I really would-” Kai could tell this guy was trying to tell Grant something, but at this point Grant was in full planning mode and not listening to a word he said.

“You fine with going back to the For Knights arena? We left Teej and the twins there to get some spell book for Potentially and-”  
“Grant, Killa went missing.” That stopped Grant in his tracks. Like he had just run into a brick wall in his car and his face went blank for a second.

“What?”

“Killa. She’s missing.”

“What do you mean Killa’s missing?” Grant leaned forward, his face flashing between so many emotions Kai couldn’t keep track. He didn’t know who Killa was, but he could tell she was someone important to these two. Someone they wanted to keep safe.

“I don’t have much information on it. She- she vanished after a bad run in For Knights. She’s been missing for two months. I’ve been trying to find her, but I- I don’t know where else she could be. If you have a way to get in touch with the Scams-”

“I’m not getting you wrapped up in a deal with the scams.”

“But they could know where she is, Grant! That… Grant, that’s my life-mate. I knew I shouldn’t trust the scam family, but I’ve turned over every stone. Grant, I’ve turned Faerun on it’s head and I- she’s still missing Grant. Killa- Grant, Killa’s _my_ Doodlers.”

“I know, I know, Yeet. But if you get tied up with the Scam’s you’re just gonna get fucked over and I Can’t let that happen to you. I don’t even want to be working with Potentially but we’ve gotta get in here and get out, we’re on a time crunch and-”

“Grant she could be dead.”

“Don’t say that.”

“But she could be.”

The two fell silent after that. A tense silence that felt like they were grappling with the truth of that statement. Grant pulled his hand away from Kai’s and stuffed both into the pocket of his hoodie, leaning back in his chair while Yeet laid his head down on the table. Kai awkwardly crossed his arms, the silence between the three making his skin crawl.

“Who’s Killa?” Kai asked, looking between both of them for just a fraction of a second before Grant answered.

“Yeet’s best friend.” Yeet looked up to straight up glare at Grant.

“She is not just my friend. She’s my fucking life-mate, man.” Yeet sounded exhausted, and like he was slowly breaking. Like if he didn’t get her back he may just evaporate into nothing. Kai remembered feeling like that after Jax went missing (probably died, but Kai won’t tell Grant that yet. Because, he’s beginning to doubt that himself). He felt a kind of sympathy for Yeet, even if he had generally mixed feelings about him. The feeling of being totally alone because you lost the very person who meant the most to you. He knew that feeling.

“Do you think we could look for Jax and Killa at the same time?” Kai asked, fidgeting the bracelets as he followed Grant to stand up.

“Got a text from Nick. He said to meet in town in ten.” Grant informed, grabbing Kai by the arm and tugging him closer. “We’ll see you around, Yeet. You said the gun was in Ravenloft?” He stuffed his phone back into his back pocket as he began to lead Kai towards the door to the tavern so they could exit and make it back to Nick in time.

“Yeah, Ravenloft. Some kid named Jax has it.” Grant faltered for a moment, looking back at Yeet and nodding before leading Kai out of the building. He walked fastener than he had been walking all day, some bad vibes radiating off him as he muttered.

“GG, you don’t think Jax could be-” Kai started, ringing his hands as he walked.

“Kai, I mean this as kindly as I _possibly_ can, but shut up for a minute.” Great. No answers. Fan-fucking-tastic.

If there was one thing Grant liked that Kai did not, it was quiet. He liked to just sit in the steady quiet with someone and bask in their presence. Kai wanted to talk. He wanted to ramble and chit-chat and tell stories. Which is why he hated this situation they were having right now. Kai respected Grant wanted quiet, he understood that was where Grant felt most comfortable. But this estranged silence was where he felt most unsafe.

He dug into his pocket to pull out the fidget cube he’d snatched out of the minivan hours earlier, opting to fill the silence as they walked to town square with clicks and clacks. Grant did not protest this course of action. 

Nick looked about as stressed as one teenager could look as Kai and Grant came up on them in town. They had one of their Kandi that Lark had definitely been the maker of in their hands and they were stretching and rolling it as a make-shift stim toy. They paced round and round in circles in the small portion of land they had claimed for themselves near some storefront. Once they _had_ spotted the other two, they were jogging over with a sense of purpose that made Kai a bit nervous. 

“We have to go home. Now. Like- like _right now_.” They spoke with a sense of urgency that left no bickering, no change to argue with them. Kai was glad, he wanted to get home to his mom. The separation anxiety was beginning to set in and he really wasn’t ready to have _another_ break down on this trip. One stint with his ADHD was bad enough. he didn't need the separation anxiety on top of that

“What? Why? What about Teej and L.O.C? We can’t just-” Grant tried to argue, grabbing Nick by the shoulder and making them face him so they would stop freaking so bad. In response, Nick made some noise of protest and promptly shoved Grant off him. 

“One, apparently time is passing in sync. Two, I don’t have _jack shit_ , and I’m gonna start having some motherfuckers of withdrawals if we don’t get home. I-I can’t just-” 

“I thought you were going clean?”

“Yeah, going. I’m not fucking- I can’t just drop it entirely. That’s fucking suicide, Grant. I need my fucking pen. Your mom is also panicking. I think something with happened Jeanne? I dunno. You got gum or something?” They seemed… Not themself. Sure, Nick had been a bit snippy over the past few weeks as they cut back on their nicotine and weed, but never downright panicked like they were right now. 

Kai knew about as little as a person could about withdrawal, he’s never seen that kind of thing. All he really knew right now was that Nick was not having a good time. 

“Okay. Okay, then let’s get going. Let’s go. If something’s going on with my mom-” 

“Someone call them, first. Kai, you have their number?’ Grant questioned, shaking his hand briefly as a form of stim. “Let’s start heading to car. Kai, call them. Nick, you need something? Water? Food?” Nick just shook their head in response, passing the other two to make their way towards the car. 

As they walked, Kai found himself repeatedly calling TJ, just trying to get him to answer the phone. But, TJ wasn’t answering. Not once would he pick up the fucking phone. Come on. 

* * *

“So, only you kids came in this time?” Kestrel asked, giving a particularly rough scrape against the stick fey were working on carving into a dagger. The entire vibe of For Knights felt tense and not good as Terry Junior thought longer on it. He had no idea where the twins were, and he couldn’t tell for ten thousand years an answer to that question. All he could really do was hope these new kids who had essentially adopted him knew what they were doing and could help him out with it, because honestly, Terry Junior was absolutely clueless to all of this stuff. They had already moved between three different zones, and no sign of his favorite set of twins and that terrified him. He wanted to know they were okay, he wanted to know they were safe. He prayed they were safe. Terry doesn’t know what he’d do if something happened to those two. 

“Um… Yeah, yeah. Just us this time. We’re looking for an old friend of Grant’s, so that’s neat. We’ve run into the Scams already, so I don’t think that’s a good sign. They usually don’t intervene unless some real shit is going down. So, that’s kind of nerve wracking. What about you guys?” He felt a bit awkward, like he wasn’t quite welcome with these people but that they wouldn’t turn him away just because of the sins of his father. 

“Kes and I are looking for something.” Krow replied, voice as deadpan as it had been all the few times xe’s spoken since Terry had met xem. 

“Yeah! We’re after the deck, cause- actually, I shouldn’t tell you that. That’s Krow’s business.” 

“Oh, I see. I-” His phone went off, interrupting whatever he was gonna say next as the ringtone came up. He pulled it out of his pocket and checked the caller I.D. _Kai Levesque._ Strange. he hit accept and raised the phone to his ear. 

“Y-ello? What’s happened? You all okay?” Kestrel looked amazed by Terry’s phone, which he couldn’t blame fer for. Faerun didn’t have a lot of advanced tech, and cell phones were a thing of sci-fi to these guys. 

“Uh, yeah. We’re fine, Teej. I just- we’re going back home. Apparently the timeline is still the same, so our parents are kind of flipping their shit. Call one of us when you guys get out of For Knights, Grant will swing back in to grab y’all if you want. But- but we gotta go. Something happened with my mom.” Kai sounded stressed, scared, and tired. And Terry couldn’t blame him. He felt about like that his first time through Faerun too. It was a terrifying place when you don’t know what’s happening. 

“Oh, I see. Well, I’m currently not with the twins but I will let you know when I find them if we need a ride. I don’t think so though, I know the spell to get us a home it’s just a matter of getting the materials.” He assured, even though eternally he was a bit panicked. The thing about Grant and Nick was that they helped keep Terry stable. The twins were great, but they weren’t good at grounding someone unless that someone was in a whole panic attack. Which, in all honesty, did not help him when he just needed someone to whisper to him that he could do the spell as he focused on casting it. 

“Okay. Just- just stay safe, TJ. Call me when you get out of For Knights. We gotta get going, get Nick his pen and get me back to my mom. So- so we’ll… We’ll- yeah.” 

“I gotcha, Kai. Don’t sweat it. I’ll call you whenever we get back through the portal and you can send someone to pick us up.” He assured, quickly saying a goodbye and hanging up. 

“Dude! What kinda magic you got in that little rock?” Kestrel asked, halting the movement of the group to snatch the phone from Terry. Fey held it up to the sunlight, looking it over like it was some kind of foreign entity. Which, Terry guessed it technically was. 

“It’s uh- it’s my cellphone. Earth stuff. Just electricity. I don’t know how I get reception in Faerun, but it works somehow.” He wasn’t to upset with stopping for a minute, since there didn’t seem to be any inherit danger around. 

Kestrel used one of feir crutches to balance as fey lowered ferself to the ground and laid both down next to them, looking over the cellphone and pressing the random buttons. 

“This is cool! I mean- some witches have contacts based on their domain, like the forest witches, but nothing like this! Earth must be super advanced. Is stuff like this normal?” Kestrel asked, looking up at Terry with a kind of curiosity that reminded him of the twins when they were younger. When they craved knowledge more then chaos. 

“Yeah, fairly common. At least, in first world countries.” Terry found himself scanning the surroundings, watching for any sign of the twins. If any of the figures he saw could possibly be lark or Sparrow. 

“You’re kidding! That’s so cool! Faerun sounds boring compared to Earth, man.” Kestrel snickered and handed him his phone back, climbing back to feir feet. “Anyways, we should go find your friends.” 

* * *

Grant and Nick had this tense energy as they drove the car home that Kai really didn’t like. It made him feel so many layers of uncomfortable that it was hard to put them all into words. 

Grant was gripping the steering wheel with a death grip, white knuckles and all. Staring at the road as they made their way down this cursed highway and back home. Nick had seemed to be trying to break whatever stim toy he was aggressively using at this point. It was now around five in the evening, and Kai had sent his mom a few texts just to keep her updated. 

**Me:** On my way home now. Sorry.

 **Me:** I’ll explain when I get home. I didn’t mean to freak you out, I’m sorry, Mama. 

**Me:** How much did their parents tell you? 

**Me:** I’m sorry.

Kai shut off his phone and dropped it in his lap, leaning on the window as they made the rest of the drive back to their living space. He felt absolutely horrid for freaking his mom out so bad. He felt even worse knowing he accidentally triggered something. All around, Kai was having a pretty sucky time., and he wasn’t sure if he should take that out on the Doodlers or just blame himself. He felt horrid in so many different ways that he wasn’t sure where to start. he guessed it was kind of Grant and Nick’s fault for talking him into this, but also, they felt so sure the time would be jacked. Not to mention processing he was just brought to a whole second dimension and apparently chosen by Hebe (Which, Kai was always personally thought he was Hermes kid, but life’s weird). Today was just not a great say all around, and Kai wished it would end. 

This whole year wasn’t very fun, if he’s being honest with himself. First Jax fucking died, so that’s pretty neat. He guessed. Then Alyssa straight up called him a tranny and dipped. He still misses her sometimes. Childhood friends are like that. Then, we get get to the big thing. he got transported across the country _and_ found out it’s all cause his dad is some fucking whack-job who wants him and Mama dead. So, that’s cool. 

See, this is why Kai should never be left alone with his thoughts for more than twenty minutes. He spirals. He spirals down into absolutely insane territory. Now, Kai could sit here and contemplate all the awful tales of his father his mom had disclosed to him over the last few months, but, Grant just pulled into the parking lot of his apartment complex. He quickly popped the door open and climbed out, muttering a thanks to Grant and a promise to call him later and practically jogging up the stairs to his apartment. 

As the door opened, he heard his mom curse and jump up. He looked over to the couch where she usually sat and found… A stranger. 

“Um… Hi?” Kai greeted. Looking from this absolute stranger to his mom and back again. “Am I like- bad time?” Yeah, sure, that’s a sentence. Cause, here’s the thing. In all his years with his mom, he cannot remember a single time when he came home and his mom had someone over. Not once. Yet, here is someone. A person, on his couch. Real funky, he’s not gonna lie. 

Mama grabbed him by the shoulders and dragged him into a tight hug, completely ignoring the fact Kai did not know this stranger who was looking distinctly anywhere but the Levesque duo. The unstoppable mother-son duo. 

“Good god, where were you? Are you okay? You look… A lot. You look overwhelmed. Are you okay?” Mama ran her fingers through his hair a few times, brushing it out of his face. “You still have your binder on, don’t you? Go take it off.” 

“Look, Mama, I’ll do all of that in a minute. Who’s _that?”_ He interrupted, pointing to the random stranger on the couch. An average built person, mildly curly hair tied back in a ponytail and angular features. They were dressed pretty casually, what you would expect of someone who looked to be in their mid-thirties and was definitely queer.

“Oh… Them. Yeah, that’s Enne. I’ll- we’ll get into that later. Go take that thing off. You’ve had it on at least twelve hours, now.” 

“Fifteen, actually.” Kai hung his head, fully prepared for the reprimanding ‘Kai Alexander Pierre!’ She tossed his way as he made that walk of shame into the bathroom to change out of it to avoid pissing his mom off even more. On his way, he grabbed a baggy shirt and a pair of pajama pants out of the dresser and disappeared. 

“God, teenagers.” Jeanne groaned, dumping herself on the couch next to Enne, who promptly did not pull her in to cuddle like they usually did. Which, she could live with that. They didn’t want to make Kai uncomfortable with the two of them being all gross and couple-y. 

“At least he’s not like- drunk or stoned. There’s worse shapes he could’ve come home in than just his binder being on too long.” Enne chimed in, patting her knee to try and comfort her. It made her smile, a little bit. It was a comforting thought. 

“Yeah, sure. I- just- I think there’s something he’s not telling me. He’s never like this.” She slumped back into the cushions as she waited on Kai to come back out. She knows he can probably hear them, the doors and walls in these apartments aren’t very thick. But, if he does maybe that will let him know that she knows that he’s not okay. Because he’s clearly not. He looks about as wrecked as he did when Alyssa pulled all the shit she did just before they moved. He looked ready to just curl up in her arms like he used to and cry for a million years, and it made Jeanne worry. Worry and worry. 

Kai exited the bathroom, now armed in his baggiest shirt and comfiest pajama pants. His usual spot next to his mom on the couch was snagged by this ‘Enne’ person and he wasn’t liking it one bit. he wanted to know who they were. Why they were here. They had no right invading the Levesque territory like this. They weren’t a fucking Levesque. 

“I texted you.” He mumbled, seating himself in the floor across from his mom and simply placing his feet against hers. He doesn’t know when this habit started, of just resting his feet on people as a way to show them his affection, but it’s been there for awhile. 

“I know. I got them. Darryl told me some things, and Henry some others. But I’m still fairly out of the loop. I just know the very vague details of the kids and their grandparents. We can worry about this tomorrow. You look drained. I may be upset, but not upset enough to make you wear yourself out even more. You’re off the hook until you look like you can give me a cohesive thought.” She nudged him, a lot of love behind the gesture. Kai didn’t move away form her, though. 

He was home. He was in safety. Even if there was some totally random stranger in his presence, they looked like they were getting ready to leave anyway. He glanced at them, then back at his mom. 

‘Can they leave? Do you need them here? Mama, I just-” He felt the emotions well up. All the feelings of being overwhelmed and overstimulated coming out at once now that he was home and didn’t feel the subconscious pressure to mask everything. 

Kai watched his mom realized just how stressed he was, and quickly shoo her- friend? He’s gonna go with friend, out of the apartment with a rushed farewell. 

In a few minutes, Kai found himself in the arms of his mother, just crying. he didn’t even know what he was crying about. He just knew that he was crying, and that he needed to cry. It felt so good to just cry. To let his emotions out in the safety of his mom’s arms with the noise of some sitcom in the background and comfort of their tiny little apartment. This was what he needed right now. Nothing else, just this. Just a good fucking cry. 


	14. the one where they had a bonding moment

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw; This isn't gonna be as straight forward as usual so strap in cause all of these are things I feel the need to warn for but have no real terms I can use an explain exactly  
> \- In the first scene, once Jeanne receives her phone call, this phone call and jeanne's inner monologue for the rest of the scene is very heavily dealing with past trauma. This scene also as subtle hints of transphobia involving Kai and Jeanne. when [he] or something similar is used, he is being misgendered or deadnamed, but I refuse to outright misgender my trans characters in text so it is changed to fit. There IS a bit with Jeanne that could be scene as deadnaming, but that is up to interpretation because it could go either way with the way I've written her character.   
> \- In the third and final scene, Grant does mention briefly Nick's sex life (but only in passing and never mentions beyond that Nickie has one) and it is a kiss scene,, so like, underage I guess? but like, it's not horny. It's just ~ awakening ~ for plot reason.   
> Thank you for bearing with me through those messy warnings.

Jeanne took a slow drink of her coffee, a bit exhausted from the events of the past few days. The situation she was in right now was exactly what she needed. Sitting here in relative silence with Carol over lunch. 

They hadn’t been coworkers for terribly long, but Jeanne had picked up the secretary job at Carol’s law firm not long after her and Kai had moved up to California. They’d grown mildly close over their months together, and Jeanne liked to say she even considered her a friend. Although, this particular get together had a bit of a tense energy after both Jeanne and Carol’s sons disappearing together for near twenty-four hours and Jeanne going into a flashback that same day. She didn’t have those often anymore, and she wished she could say they no longer shook her up as much as they did when she first started having them. But, trauma was funny like that. It never seemed to get easier. 

“You look stressed out, Jeanne. Are you okay?” Carol leaned forward, placing a comforting hand over Jeanne’s hand. 

“I’m just… Life’s stressful.” Was all she could really answer. It’d been a whole week since Kai snuck out, and she still found herself waking every hour to check he was still next to her. If there was one thing in the world Jeanne had a genuine phobia of, it was losing track of Kai. She’s had it for so long it’s hard to think there was ever a time where she didn’t feel the need to consistently know where he is, what he’s doing, and that he’s okay. Jeanne’s pretty sure she drilled it harder into Kai to carry keys between your fingers and always have some kind of knife or pepper spray than she did his multiplication tables. 

“I get that. You just make sure you’re taking care of yourself, dear. You know I’m right here if you need to talk.” 

“You sound like my mom.” Jeanne snickered. God, how long has it been since she spoke to her mom? Definitely since before she got married. It had to be like twelve years now. She should call her sometime. 

“Well, I have a daughter pretty close to your age so I’d hope.” Carol replied, letting go Jeanne’s hands and settling back in her chair. “At least, I think? You’re thirty-one, right?” 

“Um, thirty-four, actually.” 

“God, I can’t believe you’re thirty-four. You must’ve been young when you had Kai.” 

“I was… Nineteen?” 

“God, to think my daughter could have a five-year-old, that’s wild.” Carol shook her head and took a long drink. “I would’ve died if that girl told me she was pregnant at nineteen.” 

“How many kids do you have, Carol?” 

“We talking the ones I birthed or the ones I raise?” For a second, Jeanne thought Carol was being funny. Then she remembered Carol had step kids, and the dads often talked on how she would mother the kids when she really didn’t need to. 

“Either.” 

“Well, I birthed three. Daniel, Jackie, and Grant. Daniel- god, Daniel’s twenty-six now, and Jackie’ twenty-five. Jackie’s also has this adorable girlfriend, Harper. She’s been staying with us over holidays and whatnot since she was senior in highschool. So, that’s four. Then Lynn and Max, Kelly’s kids. Precious little things. Then, Paeden. And the twins. I might as well throw TJ and Nick in there as well, I’ve adopted all those kids at this point. I feel like they’re at my house more than I am.” 

“Kelly’s your- girlfriend? Right?” Jeanne asked, trying to keep all the names straight of all the people in this tight-knit group of people. She knew Carol was living with her girlfriend, and that she was thinking about ways to propose to her sometime in the next six months. 

“Yeah! Darnell set us up, actually. He’s fantastic. You should meet him.” 

“Who’s Darnell?” Jeanne swears Carol forgets she hasn’t been in this whole inner circle of friends since the beginning like the rest of them has. She’s just some newbie single mom in her early-ish thirties who got dragged in by her kid (not that she’s complaining). 

“Oh! He’s Grant’s old coach, one of my best friends. Anyways, speaking of partners, how are things with Enne? Did that dinner you three had together go well? Kai like them?” Carol had this look in her eye that proved to Jeanne she couldn’t avoid this conversation any longer than she already had. 

“It went… About as well as i expected it too. Kai’s not found of them, yet. But, he even said himself it’s only really because he’s not sure how to feel about having to share me with someone else now. It’s always just been us two. You know? Like, I think he’s really just overwhelmed with it all.” Jeanne had talked to Kai about it all a little bit, and honestly she wished she didn’t shove it all on him. Given how overwhelmed he’s been lately, finding out about Enne is not helping his stress levels in the slightest. 

“I can see that, he doesn’t seem like the kind of kid who would be totally bothered by it though. I mean like, Grant adjusted to Henry, Kelly, and Merc pretty fast. All the kids were offput at first, but-” Carol got cut off when Jeanne’s phone began ringing. At first, Jeanne thought it was Kai calling her to tell her he was going somewhere or to ask her about dinner. Maybe he was calling in to make sure she sorted out him skipping today with the school. Framed it as some cold or something. A practiced ease, at this point if she’s being honest. 

But, it wasn’t Kai. It was an unknown number. She recognized the area code as her home town, but not much else. So, she hung up. 

“Um- sorry, probably a telemarketer.” She blurted, almost returning to conversation before her phone rang again. She checked it, seeing the same number. Carol looked over at it this time. 

“Let them leave a voice mail, if it’s someone important they’ll just leave a voice mail.” It was standard advice, something Jeanne had actually been planning on doing anyway. Until, the call hung up and she was getting a third call. Even Carol seemed puzzled by that one. “Why don’t they just leave a voicemail? Hold on, I’ll answer it. It might- hm.” Carol picked up Jeanne’s phone, leaning back in her chair. Jeanne didn’t protest it, if Carol felt like she had an idea of who would be calling, Jeanne trusted her. She really had no reason not to. 

“Hello, is this Marie Smith?” A man’s voice asked. Carol had had enough experience with suspicious people given her line of work that she definitely know this guy, whoever he was, was bad news for this ‘Marie’ lady. He sounded like someone who was savoring a sweet victory. Never a very good sign. 

“Um, no. Why are you asking?” Jeanne gave Carol a confused look and she returned with a shrug and an equally confused look. 

“Oh, I’m just looking for her. Do you know her?” 

“One moment.” 

Carol put her hand over the mic, pulling the phone away from her and looking to Jeanne. “He’s asking about a Marie Smith? You know her?” The genuine flash of emotions, none of them positive, that Carol watched fall over Jeanne told her really all she needed to know. Whoever this Marie was, and whoever this guy on the phone was, they were bad fucking news for Jeanne. “What do you want me to-” 

“Give me the phone.” Jeanne demanded, reaching for it. With a lot of hesitation, Carol handed Jeanne back her phone. She noted that her hands were shaking just slightly as she took the small device. 

“How do you know that name?” It had been so many years since Jeanne had heard the name Marie. So many years since she even went by that name. It dragged up memories of her parents, of her father. Of him. It sucked, is what it did. 

“Oh, Marie! Such a pleasure to here your voice again, darling.” His voice felt like a sword to the chest, tearing her apart from the inside out as that voice settled in and made her feel like a helpless teenager all over again.

“How did you get my phone number?” Jeanne was on her feet now, too anxious to stay sitting as she stood awkwardly beside her desk. Carol was up and next to her not long after, offering a hug but nodding and stepping back when Jeanne gestured for her to. 

“It’s easy to find your wife when you want to, Marie.” 

“My name is not Marie.” Her hands quivered, and she complied as Carol moved to hold her free hand, rubbing circles into the back of her palm to try and comfort her. 

“Well, that’s up for discussion. How’s my [son?]” It was that same kind of condescending he used when he would tear her down. When she stilled lived with him. She knew he knew that Kai had transitioned, if he had tracked her back down there was no way he didn’t. He knew Kai wasn’t a girl, not anymore, yet he still… just like when Jeanne had… “Are you not going to answer me? I deserve and answer, baby. Maybe I’ll just have to go check on [him] myself.” 

* * *

The call Kai had gotten from his mom was so many levels of terrifying he didn’t know where to begin. It was a terrifying thing when your mom calls you and tells you to take the animals and got to Enne’s house with no further context. He was carrying Clara in her little transport box, that was really just a small storage tote they’d drilled holes in and put bedding in when they needed to move her around, and Fritz was on a leash trotting along in front of him. Mom had texted him Enne’s address, which honestly wasn’t too far from the apartment. 

He listened to the calming voice his favorite podcast host as he walked, letting himself zone out to the voices of the radio host that always seemed to settle him down when he got anxious like this. Kai double checked the address in his texts before checking in the mailbox for the spare key like Mama told him to. Sure enough, there it was. Part of him felt like he might be overthinking everything, but the panic in moms voice left nothing to the imagination when you thought about the exact situation the two of them were in right now. Something was happening with the sperm donor, and Mama wanted to know Kai was somewhere safe. Kai knew Enne had a big guard dog, which Mama probably trusted with her life. 

He opened the door and saw the big hulk of white fur that was Fin, and Kai was acutely aware he had a mild fear of big dogs. It wasn’t even that Fin was a monstrous dog, he came up to about Kai’s hip and was rather lean. But, as a Great Pyrenees, he had more fur then any dog should ever have, and it made him look two times larger than he actually is. The dog hopped onto his feet and wandered over to Kai. Clearly on guard at first he didn’t recognize Kai. 

Kai crouched down and placed Clara in her little box next to him. He held a hand toward Fin and let him sniff at it for a moment. 

“Hey, bud. Y-you’re pretty big, huh?” Kai chuckled, giving him a quick pet and then unleashing Fritz. They seemed to have already met before, which made a lot of sense since Fritz was Mama’s absolute baby, she’s probably brought him over before. 

Kai picked up Clara and moved to sit on the couch. He settled in and turned on the TV. He didn’t know how long he’d be here, or when Enne would be home from work, or what was going on with his mom. He didn’t know anything about the plan to take another day trip in the other dimension the rest of the group had for two days from now. All he really knew was that Teej and Twins were still in there, and that it was worrying the rest of the people who knew about where they were pretty severely. He wished he had more answers. 

Fritz hopped up, weaseling his little terrier self into the space between Kai and the back of the couch. Kai smiled at him, leaning back and listening to the white noise of Supernatural reruns and Clara digging around in her temporary home. He felt so helpless. So fucking helpless. Everything in his world was turning topsy-turvy and he couldn’t do jack shit. 

Last year it was Jaxton and Alyssa. 

He thought nothing could suck more absolute ass than going to the funeral of your best friend and in the same weak being broken up with by your childhood best friend turned terf. But, somehow this does. This sucks so fucking much. It sucks so much, knowing that his moms in danger. It’s not even a kind of danger Kai really understands, he just knows its fucking danger. And it terrifies him. He wants his mom to know she doesn’t have to worry about him while she deals with her shit. But she absolutely does. His sinking so fucking fast, and she’s going down with him. They’re standing out on the Titanic, and they already ran out of life boats. All he could do was pray something would go right. Whether that be this weird dance with Grant end, or the sperm donor gets the fuck out of their lives, or this whole whatever-the-fuck it is with Jaxton blow over, he just wants something to go right. 

Kai felt a nose nudge under his arm, and it startled him a bit. He felt the fresh tears on his cheek and the weight of a second dogs muzzle against his side. He looked over and saw Fin, head placed against him and offering affection. 

“Whatcha doing, Fin?” Kai mumbled, running his fingers through the immense amount of absolute fluff this dog was. Maybe he’ll brush Fin, it couldn’t hurt the dog. Plus, it gave him something to do. 

It took a few minutes of searching in Enne’s bathroom (which, also took a minute to find), but Kai found the dog brush. So, he sat himself down on the couch, turned up the volume on whatever shitty episode of clearly post-season 5 Supernatural and got to work on brushing out Fin, who sat at his feet and gladly let him. 

Enne showed up about twenty minutes later. They looked frazzled and concerned as they came in the front door. But, they didn’t seem alarmed Kai was just chilling in their house when they weren’t there, so clearly Mama had told them that he would be here. 

“Hey, kiddo. You okay?” They asked, parking what looked like a rolling crate by the door and hanging up keys and a lanyard on a hand attached to the wall next to it. Enne had a lot of neat little decorations like that in their house. It had a lot of personality to it all, and was very clearly queer. So, Kai liked that. 

“Um, yeah. Mostly. Do you know what happened with Mama?” They made this awkward eye contact, a strange silence between the two of them for a moment. 

“No. She just- she just told me you were gonna be over here? That’s about all I got.” They admitted, coming to take a seat on the opposite end of the couch to him. Cool. They’re _both_ clueless. Absolutely love that. 

Kai made a small hum to signal that he heard them, reaching to pull Clara into his lap. He didn’t take her out of the box (even if he really wanted to get her out of the box. She shouldn’t have to be in such a small box for so long), he wasn’t sure how Enne felt about her. Well, more specifically, how she felt about Enne. Plus, he wasn’t entirely sure Fin wouldn’t try to eat her. So that’s fun. 

The silence between the two of them was absolutely horrid. Uncomfortable in a way that silence never should be, but it always seems to be when the two of them got left alone together. The noise of Dean “Gay and Homophobic” Winchester killing Vampire #57838 was a bit distracting from the absolutely horrendous silence that is sitting with your mom’s date-friend when your mom is probably _very_ not safe and neither of you know the reason why, and the first time the two of you met, they had to leave because you had a total nervous breakdown; and the whole reason they were even there is cause you caused your mom to have a nervous breakdown, but, not by much. 

“She called me on my way home, um.. Said that- that you’d probably be staying here a while. You and her both. Um- I don’ really know if I’m allowed to take you back to your apartment so you can like- pick up Clara’s cage and stuff. But, I guess we’ll just figure all of that out later. I- I uh, I have an old lizard enclosure if you’d wanna move her into that. It’s clean, and… Empty.” Enne offered, after the discomfort of it all got too much for them to handle. 

“Um, yeah that could work. I-I just don't wanna leave her in the little box.” Kai mumbled, waiting for Enne to stand up before mimicking the movement and following them to a small storage closet. 

“Don’t worry about Fin, either. I used to have a lot of critters, and he never bothered ‘em. He’ll probably sniff at the glass and scare her real bad, but that’s it.” They assured, pulling a glass tank out and setting it down. It was nothing remarkable, but it got Clara more space and let Kai see her. That was what he wanted. He thanked Enne and they nodded, heading off to the kitchen and leaving Kai to take care of his baby. 

* * *

This. This was the kind of friendship Grant loved. The kind of time Grant loved. It was so normal, so calm, so _unexpecting._

It was just him and Nickie. Just him and Nickie laying up on his rooftop. No words, no expectations, no nothing. Just the two of them sitting her and watching the stars. Watching the stars together and owing nothing to the other and expecting nothing of each other. It felt so very perfect. 

Nickie interlaced their fingers, clutching onto each other in this blissful silence they called hanging out. Grant noted how happy she looked, laying here. They weren’t doing anything but sitting on the roof outside Grant’s window and listening to the noise of the city, but it was so good. 

They weren’t even high this time, which made it all the better. No drugs, no alcohol, no words, no nothing. Just the two of them, up here forgetting about all the chaos they were going to dive into in the day to come. All the disasters they would cause in Faerun without evening meaning to just by their existence because that always seemed to happen. 

“This is perfect.” Grant mumbled, running his thumb over the back of her hand. He listened to her snicker and felt his heart swell. He loved hearing that laugh. 

“Yeah, I guess it kind of is…” She sighed, shifting so they were just a little closer to each other. “Hey, Grant. Can I experiment on you for a second?” She asked. Grant knew what that meant. It meant Nickie was gonna do something she only felt comfortable doing to or with Grant. They’d done this to each other a couple times over the years. The first time they both got drunk (though, that was kind with with Connor so whether that qualified is up for debate), that one time Nickie did a shitty stick and poke on Grant’s arm, falling asleep cuddling someone, name some weird teen thing, Nick’s probably used Grant as her guinea pig for it. Unless it was sex thing, Grant didn’t do sex things. He just wasn’t intrigued by that shit like Nick was. 

“Go for it, Nickie. What’s the experiment?” He asked, turning to look at her for a moment. She looked… Nervous, almost. Like she was actually contemplating making a udmb decision for once, thinking about consequences which was not something Nickie Close did. Like, ever. He went to ask her if she was okay and oh- OH. She’s kissing him. That’s- okay, Grant’s going to be honest, that’s not what he expected. But, he _didn’t hate it._ Which, that’s a whole bag of worms. 

This is his best friend. And he’s kissing her. And he doesn’t hate it. It doesn’t feel the kind of wrong or strange Grant expected to be. It’s- oh shit, Grant’s kissing a _girl_. Nickie’s a girl today. He’s kissing a girl and it’s actually nice. It’s not as unappealing as he expected it to be. 

Grant placed his hand on her waist to try and steady himself. And she pulled away far too fast. She kissed to intensely to be pulling away that fast. They looked at each other for a moment, grant figured she must be having the same thoughts he was. The thoughts _holy fucking shit that shouldn’t have felt as natural as it did_ or _Jesus Christ am I bi? am I bi and into you?_ and the topic of whether or not he’s actually bisexual and not just gay is not a question Grant Wilson ever expected to have, but Nickie Close has just single-handedly wrecked his whole shit up with one kiss. 

“Sorry! Sorry, I-I should’ve made sure you knew I was gonna do that. You’re not- fuck, sorry, Grant.” She blurted, sitting up and covering her face with her hands. It took him a second to actually comprehend her words, to digest what she was saying and come down from whatever spiral she had just sent him into. 

“What? No- no, don’t… Don’t apologize. I actually- I think you just triggered some kind of straight awakening? Is that- shit is that a thing?” He was sitting up to, now. Looking at her and watching Nickie move to look back at him with a choked laugh. 

“I _am_ a goth guitarist, that’s like- two of the three boxes for gay guys, right?” 

“I think that’s lesbians, Nick.” 

“Damn. You sure?” Nickie snickered and laid back down. “Well, I guess you’re right. Kai isn’t goth _or_ a guitarist.” and Grant absolutely guffawed, clapping his hands together a little too loudly. 

“Yeah, cause Kai is _definitely_ the epitome of a gay guy, huh?” 

“Yeah, I shouldn’t be pulling at Kai for gay guy stereotypes. I should go for Noah.” 

“Noah _Fence?”_

“Yeah.” 

“Dude, that guy’s straighter than Terry!” 

“Grant, Terry is not that straight. He’s a token straight friend. That’s one thin fucking line to being bisexual, my guy.” 

“Touche, Terry does have a lot of bi energy,”

“You know he like- he had a boyfriend? It was an experimental boyfriend, but still. You do not have an experimental boyfriend if you aren’t a little gay.” 

“Yeah, Dad and Henry was a fucking experiment and now me and the twins are pretty much stepbrothers.” 

“Wild shit, my dude.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look, if I can't have canon oakson content, I'll sure as hell make a conflict with some Grant/Nick. It just be like that in Larktown, babes. 
> 
> I'm actually really freaking proud of this chapter. All the scenes in this chapter have been planned to happen since pretty much the start of the fic (minus Enne-Kai, but that's been planned since i came up with Enne too) and i finally got to start up these plot points of Grant-Nick and more Levesque History. 
> 
> Now all the key pieces are in play, and i can build towards our full story. Y'all better strap in. It's about to get crazy.


	15. the one where the main character isn't even mentioned once.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no specific trigger warnings. If anyone sees anything that may need to be tagged, let me know.

This was… unconventional to say the least. Lark, Sparrow, and Terry Junior and been thrown so far off course it wasn’t funny anymore. Lark knew that, of course. That doesn’t mean he’s not going to follow this cool adventure of where the spell book is. Specifically because some bastard wizard stole third from The Doodlers and these two new kids Terrence had picked up during their separation. Absolutely acephobic, in Lark Oak’s opinion. Nothing could possibly be more acephobic than defeating him in a duel! 

So, now, Lark Oak found himself chatting with this Kestrel individual whilst they strode along on their way to Ravenloft to track down Jaxon Likely. Which, they could discuss the absurdity of this absolute heathen who’s stolen Lark’s rightful win of the spell book being from Ravenloft, or they can focus on how cool Kestrel’s hair was! Kestrel’ hair wasn’t just _cool_ , though is was _epic_. The kind of epic array of colors Lark wished he could talk his mother into letting him do. But, he’ll also settle for the cool bleached look he has now. Bleached hair is dope as hell. 

“Friend Terrence, how far are we from Ravenloft? I would very much enjoy to arrive.” Lark sauntered up next to Terrence, placing an elbow on his shoulder, which was much too high for Lark to comfortably reach. Terrence smiled slightly and knocked Lark’s arm off him. “We’re about two hours walking out, but I’d like to take a break here in a bit to get a breather and collect some spell components. I need some supplies for my dying stuff. I know I don't need them prepared, but it’s good to have them prepared, just in case something happens. I can cast Dying Ward.” He explained, looking over the contents of his bag before looking back to the twins. “We should also visit Oakvale while we’re here. Autumn may have some information, and I’m sure she’ll want to see you two.” As always, Terrence is being a controlling father. 

“Well, Friend Terrence, I could always just do my druid thing and go to Oakvale by myself. There’s some oak trees up there and-” 

“I mean both of you, Sparrow.” Dammit. Lark was not getting out of the boring parts of returning home, was he? 

See, Sparrow loved visiting Autumn. Which, good for them. Of course. But, Lark never enjoyed visiting his family in general. He liked to act like he did, but he really didn’t. Family visits meant uncomfortable silence and dealing with the knowledge of all the shit Barry did to Lark, more specifically.. Murder him. So, that’s fun. 

“I shall put off visiting Autumn until the last possible minute, Friend Terrence.” Lark stated. “Also, correct me if I’m wrong but there’s a rock-climbing portion coming up soon, correct?” Lark hooked his arm into his siblings, leaning ever slightly into Sparrow as they trotted down this old dirt road. 

Terrence looked down at the map and nodded, “Yeah, yeah. There’s a cliff-face. Um, Kestrel if-” Before Terrence could even finish what he was saying, Kestrel cut him off. Lark found that very amusing. 

“I gots it, my dude! I’ll figure it out.” Kestrel assured them and Lark didn’t doubt fer for a second. If he’d witnessed one thing in watching Kestrel over their past two days of travelling together, it was that Kestrel was stubborn as a mule and if fey needed any help, Krow would be the only one fey’d let help fer. 

“Kestrel, you will not figure it out.” Krow muttered , not looking up from whatever xe was scribbling in xyr notebook as they walked. “last time you tried to figure it out, you broke your good leg.” Xe shut the book and tucked it back away in xyr pockets, looking disinterested in this whole conversation, “I can carry you up, or something. I’m not dealing with you whining about having two fucked up legs for eight weeks.” Krow said it with so much finality that no one questioned xem further. 

“Yeah, fine, whatever. I don’t like it, though.”

“You do not have to like it, I will much rather you swallow your pride and be carried up the cliff face than be injured. Would you not say the same for me if roles were reversed?” Kestrel opened feir mouth to retort, to tell Krow that fey absolutely could climb the cliff xe was just being dramatic and overprotective like xe always was. But, fey couldn’t say that. Because xe wasn’t being overprotective, and xe used Kestrel’s own love for xem against fer. 

“Fine. Doesn’t mean I can’t climb it though.” Fey argued, almost placing their crutch down on Krow’s foot just to piss xem off. 

“Literally, you cannot. I’ve watched you try. You can do many things, Kes, climbing is not one of them.” Kestrel acted like fey were gonna bite Krow’s hand when xe ruffled up fer hair. Xe liked to do that, to mess with Kestrel’s hair. 

The group fell back into silence, well, other than the twins bickering with each other on occasion but according to Terry that happened all the time so it was nothing to be worried about. They reached the cliff within the hour, and Kestrel was grateful terry said they should take a break before they climbed up it. 

Minutes later, fey found ferself curled up against the base of the cliff with Krow next to fer listening to the Sparrow Oak tell fer about something called ‘Homestuck,’ Kestrel had no idea what that was, but it was fun to listen to them talk while fey let Krow rub some kind of lotion into fer arms where the crutches chafed the most on long journeys like this. 

“So then, Dave like meets his future self. Dave from the future comes back and talks to _our_ Dave, so we call him Future Dave, so that’s cool as hell and-” Sparrow rambled, hands flailing animatedly as he told fer all the tales of these (presumably fictional, but Kes has seem some wild shit so fey don’t assume) kids and their endeavors. 

“So, who’s going up first?” Kestrel asked, tucking feir crutches into fer bag of holding to be ready to make this trek up the cliff side. Fey looked over when Lark and Sparrow both sped past and seemingly effortlessly began making their way up. Kestrel used to be able to do that. 

“Them, apparently.” Terry snickered, slinging his satchel over his shoulder. “You to go next, I’ll go last to make sure no one like- nothing bad happens.” He offered, looking between Krow, who was already preparing for xyr climb, and Kestrel, who was sitting next to him in the grass. 

Krow tested xyr grip on the cliff, and Kestrel watched as xe lugged xemself up and onto the first few footholds. Xe craned to look back at Kestrel, “I don’t trust myself to carry you up this, Kes. You okay with Terry carrying you up?” Xe asked, ready to hop back down and figure out some other solution in case Kestrel said no. But, sure enough Kestrel gave a thumbs up and gestured for Terry to hoist fer up. Epic. 

Now, Terry was used to carrying people. He carried the twins a lot, and Nick when he got to drunk or stoned to hold himself. But carrying Kestrel on his back up this steep mountain side. He could feel feir anxiety as fey had feir arms wrapped tight around his neck. If the cliff was any easier to climb, he’d get the two of them to the top no problem. But the footholds were small, far and few in between, and Terry was hyper aware of the fact the only thing holding Kestrel onto him was feir grip around his neck. He had no doubt that the kid had arm strength, his fear was in him stumbling and causing fer to loose feir grip. It was a terrifying thought. 

Terry could feel the rocks and holds shifting under his and kestrel’s combined weight, and he focused more on just getting to the top than actually where he was where he was putting his feet as they climbed. Which, in hindsight was a very bad idea. He kept pushing forward, not noticing how the footholds were beginning to crumble under his feet. His foot settled on a particularly weak spot, and instantly he was clutching at the side as he lost his hold. All he could hear as Kestrel’s scream as he was hanging onto his hold for dear life. 

The warlock doesn’t think he’s ever cast mage hand faster in his life. He felt some of the weight of Kestrel leave his shoulders and he took a deep breath. Focus, Terry. focus, dammit. Just get to the top, you’re so close. Don’t drop Kestrel and get to the fucking top already. just seven more feet. 

Krow reached for Kestrel’s hand as they got close enough for xem to grab. Terry was getting his hands on the top of the cliff, and Sparrow was helping Krow pull Kestrel off him. Kestel always wound up being heavier than people expected, mostly because fer barbarian levels forced them to gain a lot of muscle really fast, it came in useful when they needed to make a quick buck in a tavern, if Krow’s being totally honest. 

“I have you, Kes. i have you. I have you.” Krow assured, managing to drag Kestrel over and into xyr lap. Xe expected how hard fey latched on. Xe expected the shaky breaths and fer playing with xyr hair. 

“Jesus fucking Christ don’t anyone ever make climb anything ever again.” fey muttered, curling a little closer, “I could’ve died. I could’ve fucking died. Krow… Krow i could’ve died.” 

“You’re not, though.” 

“But I _could’ve_ Krow. What if-” Fey sat up and looked at Krow, eyes red and puffy as fey hiccupped and tried to settle down, but Krow could tell they were already spiralling. 

“Kestrel, look at me. Breathe, you’re okay. We’re okay.” Krow assured, looking back at the three doodlers, both twins checking in on Terry as Terry kept looking over at Kestrel. 

“Are you okay, Kestrel?” Terry asked, managing to settle the twins enough to come over and check on them. “We can take a break, that was- that was scary. We can set up for the night or-” Kestrel snatched feir crutches out of Krow’s bag, pushing ferself up to fer feet and steadied ferself. 

“No, no. I’m fine. I’m fine. Let’s keep moving. Krow and I have to get that spell book if we’re ever going to find xyr little sister.” Terry seemed hesitant to keep moving, since, even in Krow’s opinion, and xe’d seen Kestrel on the brink of literal death, the kid looked rough. But, that was xyr stubborn ass best friend for you. 

“Are you-”

“I’m pretty damn sure. Let’s just go. Okay? Let’s just go.” Krow took xyr rightful spot at Kestrel’s side, letting Kestrel go at whatever pace they felt comfortable going at the moment, even if the twins were sprinting ahead. 

“Alright, okay, then, next stop; Ravenloft, to visit the wizard Jaxon Likely.” 

“You think he’s related to Mark or Scam?” Lark blurted, falling back next to Terry who was looking over a map. 

“It _is_ possible.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wild how i set up two story arcs i'd planned since the beginning last chapter, than never even mentioned Kai or grant in the very next chapter. completely forgot about them. 
> 
> also? if you don't love autumn oak? are- are you doing okay? Like, i just wanna check in, man, are you good?


	16. the one where they play among us?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No content warnings for this one. I am aware of the 'plot inconsistency,' between this chapter and the first Faerun chapter, it's intentional. 
> 
> It's also really short, sorry. Mostly me being fucking in love with my stupid little thirty-something queers,,,, I'm such a sucker for Jeanne and Enne. 
> 
> I promise next chapter will have actual appearances from canon characters, I just couldn't see how to fit that into this one. At this point this fic is just "Lark writes a whole ass novel but advertises it as dndads fanfic just so occasionally he can add in the oak boys or nick close and it not be weird"

One thing Jeanne still isn’t used to with Enne, it’s how gentle they are. She never has to worry about pissing them off, or watch what she says in fear of causing an all out war. They were so so gentle. And she was hyper aware of that fact on nights like tonight, tonight with a coffee in her hands and curled up under their arm as they watched Nightmare Before Christmas and waited on Kai to get home from his Dungeons and Dragons session at the local game store. This was exactly what she had wanted for years, a cozy night in with someone she really felt safe with. Even if their situation right now sucked absolute ass, it was the support that made it all worth it. The love. 

When Jeanne had called Enne to tell them that her ex had called her and had her address, they told her to get moved in by that night. Without even hesitating. They hadn’t been together long, Jeanne knew that. barely five months, now. August to December is such a brief time to know each other, but Jeanne felt like she’d known Enne years already. Like somehow, her life had led her to this hodgepodge group of people who had welcomed her into her circle in San Dimas, California. Between the close friends for both her and her son, and the partner, every sign if beginning to point to that. it was baffling to her. 

“Kai should be back any minute know.” Enne stated, checking their watch and scratching Fin’s head, who was snoring contentedly on the other half of the couch, head resting in his owner’s lap. 

“He said his session might run longer tonight, something about a boss fight.” Jeanne replied, subconsciously checking her phone for a text or call from her son. He usually kept in good contact when he was out, even more so know that he knew what was going on. He wanted his mom to know where he was and when he’d be home just as much as she did. “He promised me he’d walk home on the phone with me or Grant, so I’ll be getting a call shortly.” Enne hummed and moved Jeanne’s bangs so they weren’t hanging in front of her eyes. 

“You look tired, darling.” They cupped her cheek for a moment, before letting go and taking her cup to set it on the inn table. 

“I don’t think I’ve felt more exhausted in years.” 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Enne adjusted so they were more of sitting next to each other than cuddling now, and Jeanne bitterly noted she wished they hadn’t moved an inch. When did she become so smitten with them? How long into their bonding did they managed to dismantle her walls and make her fall effortlessly in love? God, she hasn’t been in love in so long… Was she ever? 

“I… Not really. As long as i keep him from tracking us, and- and my son’s safe, I’ll be fine. It’s just… Terrifying.” Jeanne sighed and leaned her head onto Enne’s shoulder, letting them hold her by the shoulders. 

“I get that. When my mom reached out to me, I was… I was terrified. And- and that’s nowhere near as bad as the situation you’re in, and I’m not saying it is- I- I just. I-” 

“I get it, Enne. i know what you mean.” 

“Y- yeah. Yeah.” And that’s one of the little things. When Enne got nervous, or worried, they’d forget their degree in poetry, suddenly forget how the whole language work and fumble over their words like a nervous teenager on a date. It was one of the cutest things on Earth to Jeanne. She leaned her chin against their chest, looking up at them from her now just slightly uncomfortable sitting position. 

“I love you.” It felt natural to say. Not forced to reciprocate their statements before she was ready, no anxiety behind the words and no further fear. Nothing. Enne looked a bit shocked she said it. They knew how hesitant she was to say things like that, how long it took her to admit she genuinely did love someone that’s not her son. They also knew that came from never really having anyone else to love. 

“I- I love you, too, Jeanie.” They smiled. A dorky, love struck smile, and they kissed her. And it felt so right. Like all the puzzle pieces of her fucked up life were coming together to make this one picture. And she could see it. She could see it so clearly. Growing old with them. Spending the rest of her days right here, in this little house in California and spending her nights laying next to this person who’s done nothing but welcome and support her. Raising her grandchildren in this house and embracing herself in the safety of this house with no one but Enne, who couldn’t judge her if they tried, to see. 

They sat there for a moment, content silence between them. The noise of nightmare before Christmas fading into the background until the door opened and snapped them both out of their love-struck daze. 

“Kai! You were supposed to text me when you were one your way home!” Jeanne huffed, standing up to go greet her son. Part of her swear he wasn’t wearing that shirt when he left earlier, but that might be her own mind playing tricks on her. 

“Oh- uh, sorry, Mom. I forgot. I have a lot of homework though, so, I’m gonna go work on getting that done.” So many red flags lit off in Jeanne’s head. Number one; he called her mom. Kai never calls her mom. That’s their codeword for when he needs ‘motherly assistance’ out of a situation he doesn’t want to be in. Number two; Kai hasn’t gone to school the past two days, how the hell does he have homework? And number three; that’s demeanor was anything but her son’s. She watched him scamper off and climb up the ladder into his make-shift bedroom in Enne’s attic and noted how he didn’t say anything else to Jeanne. Something must’ve happened. It was obvious he didn’t want to talk to her about it right now, so she figured she’d check back in with him in a little bit. Kai usually needed time to process happenings before he talked about it, so that’s fine by her. 

Potentially climbed the ladder up into this young man’s room and almost as soon as she could, the disguise was dropping. She flopped her body into the attic bedroom and pulled her legs in after herself, glancing back down the wobbly lader to those two people in the living room. She knows the red-headed woman is his mother, but she doesn’t know the other ones name. She thought Kai only lived with this mom, so that’s weird. 

She looked around the small room. She noted the unmade bed and random boxes and the general clutter. Organized chaos, really. On the bed, though, placed carefully was a blond doll. Potentially was pretty sure she was from the Earthen pioneer age, but she wasn’t sure. She didn’t know much about Earthen history. 

She pulled out the weird Earth device Jaxon had given her before she left, something called a cellphone, and called him. It only took a few rings before her new ‘step-brother’ picked up the phone. Honestly, she didn’t think of him as anything but a pest, but Uncle mark demanded they work together. 

“Scam! hi! You in his room?” She cringed at the shortening of her name. It drudged up the painful memories of those days with her father. When he was alive. Before the Doodlers killed him. Sure, Uncle Mark had pretty thoroughly taken his place, but he would never be Scam Likely. 

“I told you not to call me Scam. But, yes. I am.” She picked up the doll. She noted the limbs on the little creation were lose, and that it’s eyes looked faded and… silver. Not natural. 

“Awesome! We need an anchor for Kai, mark wants him-” 

“I thought earthen boys didn’t get dolls. i thought only human girls got dolls.”

“What?” 

“Your friend, Levesque. He has a doll. I thought earthen boys didn’t get dolls.” It was a high quality doll, much better than weird contraption Potentially used to create with her father as a child to entertain herself with while he went off on missions. 

“Oh, yeah. That’s Kirsten. She’d be a good anchor. He’s had her since he was little, it was his moms and-” 

“But it’s not conventual for a human boy to be gifted a doll?”

“Kai wasn’t always a dude, Shelly. He’s only been out like- I think a year and a half? I dunno, but he got the thing from his mom. It’s like- he loves that doll. I think it’s creepy. The doll should be fine though, Shelly. Just grab her and come on back.” 

“Right, right. I’ll be right there.” Potentially hung up the phone, looking over the room and picking up a peculiar picture of what must be a younger Jaxton. Framed and everything and set carefully on a box placed next to Kai’s bed like a makeshift nightstand. She flipped it over out of general curiosity. _‘If there was anyone Jax would’ve wanted to have his things, if would be you and Grant. ~ Alexis’_ Interesting. 

Potentially tucked the doll into her bag of holding into her bag and put back on her disguise to climb back down the ladder and slip seamlessly out of the house. Flawless scamming as always. 

* * *

Jaxton starred at the contact he’d thought he’d never open again. There was no point in pretending he wasn’t alive anymore, no point in pretending he didn't miss them and crave their company. He took one deep breath and sent the text.   
  
**Me —- > g4m3r b0yz B): **hey. i miss you guys

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was written while I have been dummy sick for the past few days, um, as I'm writing this I'm on like,,,, four hours of sleep and severely congested. If the Potentially scene is a little worse than my usually work, that's totally my b, I just really want to get my climax because I've been planning this shit since August-ish. 
> 
> I also love how that final scene has such a weird aura to it and it's like serious for everything but that stupid groupchat name. Grantcore right there.


	17. the one where the end starts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw; mentions of Scam's death in scene one, vaguely described/implied panic attack in the middle of scene two, mentions of manipulation/gaslighting in Terry's monologue at the end of chapter 2. 
> 
> None of these content warnings are very severe, but, I do understand some people are highly sensitive to topics so I've put them here anyway.

The dads were a whole other ball park in Kai’s world. He knew none of them well, but all of them decently. The one he currently knew the least, however, was Glenn Close. Nick’s rockstar turned music teacher dad. Which, was a little weird at best. It was even weirder that now he’s awkwardly sitting on Glenn’s couch with Grant as the Closes did… Something. Something to do with the fact that they were planning another Faerun raid. Kai, as always, wasn’t sure what was happening. He told his mom he was staying at Nick’s for the weekend (“Don’t worry, man! My dad’s not a narc, he’ll cover for us. He’s dope.”) 

Grant was leaned onto Kai’s side as the two of them waited for Glenn and Nick to do whatever it was they were doing and it was a welcomed comfort to the two of them. Kai always found himself calming down around Grant. Even if their circumstances right now were… Complicated at best. It had always been complicated, ever since Kai moved here. Dancing the line between the five years of knowing each other intimately through online Skype calls and playing video games and having to re-meet each other and learn their mannerisms and how to fit their pieces together into something that resembled a friendship, and what both were hoping would turn into something more once life calmed down enough for them to focus on that sort of thing. 

“Okay, Newbie-” Glenn started, moving to stand in front of the couch. 

“Kai.” 

“Right! Kai, you’re what? Level…. 3?” 

“Level 2.”

“Jeez, okay. Worse than I thought. Yeah, yeah, okay. I gotcha. I gotcha. I think I got some cool armor stuffed in my old closet that would keep you from getting completely beefed out there. See, the world works so that the mobs that come for you will match the skill level of the party. So, anything you guys fight will be like- level seven or eight. To match Grant. Also, my dude Nick’s like- hella powerful as a Cleric, so like once you get up to his- her? Their level you’ll be golden, my man.” Kai could tell Glenn’s head was running at a million miles a minute. 

“So, Dad, you can hook us up with some gear that’ll protect him?” Nick asked, leaning on the back of the couch. “Because, we don’t have Teej, who is the only line of defense between Kai and death. I don’t know any protection spells, I’m a trickster.” 

“I think my guns-”

“You’re guns in Faerun, Pops.” Nick hopped over the couch, forcing himself between Kai and Grant. Kai was so cozy too. 

“How you know that, brat?” Glenn asks, opening up a closet and beginning to rummage around in it. 

“P.S, her dad said she had to find it, so now it’s our problem to grab it for her.” Kai watched Glenn paused for a minute, than turned to Nick completely for the first time in this entire exchange. It was honestly a little jarring to be looking at Mr. Close head on. The entire time Kai had been here he was scurrying around and digging in boxes and looking at him for a just a second before turning to something else again. A man on a mission. 

“What do you mean her dad? Potentially’s Scam Likely’s kid, right? There ain’t no way that’s her dad she’s talking about.” 

“Whatchu mean, Pops?” 

“Scam Likely’s been dead since like- since like Ravenloft, bro.” 

“I… For real?” 

* * *

“I got two options for you guys, here. Compliments of my boss.” The wizard leaned forward on the table, laying out a deck of cards face down. He was a simple man. Bleached curls and dark skin and even darker eyes. There was a mischief in his features, a yearning for chaos. The twins had that once, too. Sometimes Terry still sees it in Lark. 

“And your boss is…. Scam Likely?” You would’ve thought Sparrow just said murdered Jaxton’s entire bloodline by the look he got in response to that statement. 

“Hell no! I may be a Likely, but not a _Scam_ Likely. No, fuck no. Don’t ever say that again. Who I work for is irrelevant.” Jaxon gathered the card deck back up into his hand. doing some kind of movie shuffle with it. 

“It actually is relevant. How do we know we can trust you if we don’t know who we’re getting help from?” Krow argued, leaning an arm on the table, but quickly got it shoved off by Jaxon. 

“You work with Potentially Scam, right?” Jaxon asked, setting the cards down and looking between the five people in front of him with a practiced stiffness. Terry could see the man running calculations and possibilities in his head. Terry used to be like that. 

“Yes. Not willingly, but yes. We’ve been working with Potentially.” Jaxon looked at Krow and studied xem for a moment. Terry was ready to counter spells, counter attacks, something. But, Jaxon just looked back to his cards and began shuffling again. 

“We both work for the same person.” He leaned back in his seat, propping his feet up on the table. 

“So you both work for Scam Likely?” Sparrow asked, working on braiding Lark’s hair because they’re, well, them. And, Jaxon laughed. He let the question sink in and then he laughed. Long and hard. 

“Is that who she said she worked under? Hm, ever the dreamer, I suppose. But, no. We don’t work for Scam. He’s long dead. Now, on a different note. Is your whole party with you?” Terry didn’t like the energy of this man. He’d already pieced together this was Jaxton Wull, but the energy he had didn’t sit right. He was calculating things in his head. Poking holes in the narrative he’d been crafted by Grant and Kai over the last three weeks. Things didn’t match up like they were supposed to, and it was setting off alarm bells in Terry’s heads. So many alarm bells. 

“Nope, we’re missing three. Nick Close, Grant Wilson, and Kai Levesque.” Terry replied, testing to see if he’d get a reaction from Grant and Kai’s names. He did. Jaxton stopped for a moment, loosing his composure momentarily. But, he nodded and moved his legs off the table to lay out the cards. One in front of each person. 

“I would like you, Terry, to flip your card.” Jaxton laced his fingers together, leaning his elbows on the table and challenging Terry to not listen. And Terry was not one to back down from a challenge, even if his rationality was telling him to walk away and take his friends with him. He was stubborn bastard. And with a flip of the pink-backed card, nothing happened. Terry was left staring at a simple four of hearts. A four of hearts he didn’t trust for one second. 

“Hm. Intriguing.” Jaxton did not seem intrigued. He knew who had what cards, he was just watching them trigger whatever effects they caused. “Lark, Sparrow, please flip your cards.” He pointed to the two green-backed cards in front of the twins. Terry didn’t trust the smirk on his face for a single second, nor did he trust that those cards wouldn’t cause some catastrophe. He went to stop them, but it was too late. The twins moved fast as always, flipping the cards. A two of spades, and a king of spades. 

It took the party a second to register what had happened. The room lit up a vibrant green, there was a cut off scream from Sparrow. Then silence. When terry’s vision returned, he wasn’t sure what to do for a moment. he was mid-movement, reaching to grab Sparrow’s wrist before they flipped the card, but, there was no longer a Sparrow sitting there to grab. He made eye contact with Lark, who was in a state of shock and panic. It was also clear he was about to either go ballistic of have a panic attack. 

“Where’d they go?” Lark said it so quietly, so scared and sheepish. Like he had no idea where to move from here. “Where’s my sibling?” Terry finally got the courage to look over the cards. Where the face of the king should be on the card, sat a frozen Sparrow, their eyes glancing around frantically. 

“They’re exactly where he needs to be.” Jaxton collected the card holding Sparrow hostage, and Terry racked his brain with every spell and piece of magic he knew. Trying to figure out what the hell kind of spell Jaxton must’ve used to do that. it wasn’t any kind of spell that he knew. “Now, Kestrel and Krow. I would like the two of you to flip your cards over.” He displayed the card, engrained with the panicked face of Sparrow Oak, like it was some kind of trophy. Terry watched both of them, neither keen on listening to that instruction. Neither moving to do that. He really couldn’t blame them. 

Lark’s breathing was uneven. He was freezing up, and Terry could watch that distant look enter his eyes. The look that meant Lark was slipping away from the world and into the darkest depths of his own head. Terry pulled Lark across the chair separating them so that he could pull Lark under his arm and let the younger just cling onto him for stability. Terry cursed himself for not being able to completely focus on calming down Sparrow, but he needed to get the four of them out of here. Get Sparrow back. Figure something out, god dammit. Something. Anything. 

“Hm. It seems you don’t want to play my game. A pity.” Jaxton lit the fire hands cantrip, and moved to set Sparrow’s card alight. Kestrel moved out of feir chair faster than Terry would’ve expected fer to. Fey didn’t even know Sparrow well, and neither of those two tried to hide their distaste for the dads. 

“We’ll play! We’ll play! Don’t- don’t hurt them! Don’t hurt him!” Fey were frantic, leaning heavily on the crutch fey grabbed hold of for stability as fey settled back into feir chair, Krow going to help fer and getting promptly pushed back. “We’ll- we’ll play the stupid game. Don’t hurt them.” 

“Kes, I’m not gonna-” Krow tried to protest, but clearly xe was in no place to try and protest Kestrel’s decisions today. 

“Either we flip the stupid cards, or the kid- god knows what’s gonna happen to that kid.” Kestrel’s voice was low, determined. A kind of serious Terry had yet to here from the perky little kid they’d picked up in For Knights. 

“But they’re a fucking Doodler! He’s the one who-” 

“Shut up! I know what the Oaks did, Krow! Let me remind you, you’re not the one that affected.” 

“It affects me e-fucking-nough to not care if the fucker lives or dies. We sat there for-” 

“Krow, I love you, but shut the fuck up. I don’t care what the Oaks caused, we are not deliberately causing anymore death. I saw enough death in Neverwinter.” 

“Fine. On three?” The two of them held onto each others hands, a silent anxiety in the room as they flipped their grey-backed cards. A three of diamonds, and a joker. 

Krow vanished in a puff of a dark grey smoke. No explanation, xe wasn’t even left in the card. Xe was just gone. Completely gone. Vanished into some kind of void. Maybe the Astral Plane. 

Terry registered Kestrel’s scream before anything else. Registered fer going into fight mode without a second thought as fey pulled the crossbow off feir back and pointed it at Jaxton, hands shaking to bad to properly knock an arrow or aim. Only thinking about defense after watching feir best friend be presumably Donjoned.

“Give xem back! Give xem the fuck back!” Terry reached over, gently pushing Kestrel’s aim to the floor. It wasn’t very hard. Fey were scared and offput and just generally freaked. 

“Don’t attack him, Kestrel. If we attack, he might hurt Krow and Sparrow.” 

“The warlock is right, Kestrel. I hold the power in this situation. And I’ll return your companions to you. If you return two companions to me.” Terry bit his lip. Knowing who Jaxton was, it wasn’t hard to piece together who he was talking about. 

“You want Grant and Kai.” Terry stated, watching the roguish wizard scoop the three remaining cards on the table, not meeting Terry’s eyes. 

“I do.” Jaxton stated, shuffling cards with disinterest. 

“Why?” 

“Why does that matter?” 

“Because you left them. Why claim the back now, Jaxton? You’re- you’re… I don’t get it. I don’t get any of it.” Terry finally stood to his feet, looking at Lark who was slowly calming back down and Kestrel who was just barely keeping ferself grounded. 

“You don’t have to.” Jaxton snarled, not looking up from his deck of cards. 

“Actually, I do. here, let me lay this out for you, and, you stop me when if I’m wrong. There’s four years between you and Kai, right? Three between you and Grant?”

“Yes.” 

“Okay. You meet them. I’m assuming you met Grant through Fortnite and Kai through like- Minecraft or something. You form a Discord server for all your cool online gaming friends to hang out and play with each other. The three of you grow close, cause your three loner kids in different parts of the country with no one else to talk to. But, once Grant and Kai reach middle school, they start making friends. Close friends. Grant gets me, and Nick, and Lark, and Sparrow. Kai got Alyssa and whoever else was in his old friend group. And suddenly, they both have less time to spend with you. You don’t like that. You’re still alone in whereever it is your from. And, ya know what? I think I finally pieced together why all the stories Grant and Kai told me about you made my skin crawl and gave me the worst kind of feeling, the feeling that you weren’t the saintly best friend they said you were. That there was something darker there, and they had pushed it down and created an idealized form of you after you ‘died’ to convince themselves you were actually a good friend-” 

“I _was_ a good friend.” 

“You tried to be a good friend. They convinced themselves you were a good friend. But you were a manipulative asshole, whether you meant to be or not. Grant’s told me plenty, and I’m good at piecing things together. So, I’ll bring you Kai and Grant, but if you try _anything,_ I’m fire-balling your ass.” 

“Fine. Get me my boys by sundown tomorrow, and I'll return your party members unharmed.” 

“I’ll see you tomorrow then.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I deffo did just drop this fic for like a month, but that's because I needed to plot out some final endgame stuff cause we are getting there. There's at MAX gonna be six more chapters. This fic was very fun to write, and I'm very excited to close it all up. And I promise y'all the Wilvesque content WILL come in the final stretch.


	18. the one where they kind of just talked

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> genuinely no content warnings this time!!   
> kai and grant get to sit down and chit chat for awhile, which is poggers B)   
> also, if you don't like Kestrel, sorry not sorry fey're my new favorite

If Terry had the time to teach Kestrel every new thing about Earth as they got back to his house to grab supplies, he would. But, in the back of Nick’s car, racing at god speed back to Stampler house as Nick berates them with a million and a half questions is not how Terry would like to answer every single wild thought that came into the poor kid’s head. 

As expected the lights in his house were still on, Mom probably still up and waiting for him. He felt guilty for disappearing into Faerun for so long, but things needed taken care of. Terry was quick in moving into the house, leaving Kestrel and Nick to either stay in the car or to follow, depending on the decision they made. 

The door opened louder then Terry wanted it to, and he also got way more attention than he wanted. Mom was up. He knew she was. But, he had to B-Line past where her and Ron sat on the couch to restock on rations and grab at least seven more water bottles. refill his backpack, grab some of the old magic items from the basement, grab Kai and Grant, and get this whole fucking disaster over with. 

“Terry! Terry! Terrence!” Mom was trying to get his attention. He could hear the hurt and the tears and the anger in her voice. He couldn’t look her at her though. Not until he could come home, and crash in his bed. Not until he got Kestrel back to Faerun, and the twins back safely. He still felt guilty about dumping Lark on Autumn and dipping like that. But, he needs to get this quest over with. 

Mom grabs his arm, forcing him to stop filling his backpack with granola bars and water bottles and look at her. 

“Terry, you can’t- Terry where have you been?” Her eyes were glassy. She was just an inch shorter than him. That inch felt like miles now, as Terry has to lower his eyes just slightly to meet hers. He felt himself breaking, cracking apart. It settled into his soul that he was home, and with him mom, and the world wasn’t going to end tomorrow if he didn’t get to the bottom of whatever bullshit the Likely’s are pulling by tonight. It was such a nice feeling. “Oh, baby, you look so tired. Where are the twins? What’s going on?” Mom placed her hand against Terry’s cheek for a moment, before sighing and pulling him into a hug. In milliseconds the whole world melted into just this moment. Just Mom, hugging him tight and letting him have a minute. 

“The- the twins they’re still-” 

“They’re still in Faerun?” He nodded pressing his face into the crook of neck to try and hide the fact he is definitely crying not. Bordering on sobbing, in all honesty. His mother just held him a bit tighter, letting him have his moment to cry everything out. 

“And Sparrow is- I don’t know where Sparrow is. And Mark is- mark’s doing something and- and now Kai and Grant involved somehow and I have to bring them back in with me if i wanna save Sparrow and Krow and-” 

“Who’s Krow?” 

“Xe- xe’s a Faerun kid. Xem and Kestrel helped me out in For Knights and-” 

“Okay, okay. Breathe. You’re okay. Is Kestrel the person out there with Nick?” 

“Yeah, yeah. Fey’re with Nick. I- look, Mom, I gotta. I gotta pack and I gotta-” Terry pushed her off, moving to pick up his bag, “Where’s Ron’s old magic stuff? N my old items? I-I need them. I need to-” He zipped up the backpack, slinging it over his shoulder. 

“Terry, no, slow down. You don’t need to do anything. Stay home for the night, I’ll get you n your friend packed in the morning, and the two of you can be on your way. Take a break, Terry. Please.” 

“Mom I can’t- I- I gotta get Grant and Kai and get back to Faerun and get the twins back together and Lark’s still at Autumn’s and-” He went to move past her, only to feel two strong hands grip his arms and pull him back to the spot he was standing before. And, his mother spoke. This time her tone was firm, giving Terry an order rather than asking him. 

“No, Terry. You look about ready to keel over. Get your friend inside, I’ll set up the guest room. You’re sleeping here tonight. Your friend can sleep on the trundle in your room. Go.” She shooed him off without another word. 

Terry found himself escorting Kestrel into the house without another word, silently bringing in his new found friend and guiding fer to his bedroom tucked away in a niche little corner of the house. Kestrel was asking so many questions, amazed by everything fey saw. Terry wished he had the energy left to answer them all, but he knew if he tried to answer any he’d use up any strength he had left. 

He pulled the trundle bed out from under his own, throwing a pillow onto the already made covers. 

“You can sleep there tonight, um… Either we can go get some dinner real fast, or whatever. I- I’m probably gonna go talk to my mom.” Terry through his backpack into his desk chair and picked up his favorite hoodie that was sitting on his desk from where he left through it. 

“Um- kay. I um- why aren’t we heading back already?” Kestrel asked, settling ferself onto the trundle bed and leaning fer crutches against the wall. 

“Mom said so. I spooked her pretty bad with my disappearance. Sorry, I know earth is overwhelming to Faerunians on their first run through.” 

“Y-yeah. I’m…. This is weird.” 

“Yeah…. Are you hungry?” Terry opened the drawer of his desk he stashed the Doodler’s favorite snacks in, because of course he has a desk drawer he stashes their favorite snacks in. 

“Um.. Lil’ bit, yeah.” He grabbed out a pack of mini muffins and tossed them at Kestrel. 

“If you want something else, there’s plenty of junk in this drawer, or there’s the kitchen down the hall. I’m gonna go talk to my mom, just come get me if you need anything.” 

* * *

The small couch in Grant had in his room was not big enough for two people to lay on it, that was for certain. That didn’t stop him and Kai, however. Currently, Grant found himself sitting normally on the couch, with Kai half-laying against the arm with his legs propped in Grant’s lap. It was a cozy way to be, and even better to be watching Kai take over Grant’s carefully crafted survival world. Sure, Kai may be reeking havoc on the gold farm Grant spent six hours building, but at least he’s having fun. A fun grant might have to squash in favor of honesty. 

“Hey, um, Kai?” 

“What’s up, GG?” Kai didn’t look away from the TV, but Grant could tell he was listening from the way he adjusted his shoulder and sat up a bit. 

“So.. Um, Nickie and I kissed the other night and-” Kai paused the game, looking at Grant now. There wasn’t eye contact, Grant knew Kai hated eye contact with a burning passion, but he was looking at him. 

“Oh?” Anxiety welled up in Grant’s soul. He couldn’t point what emotion was on Kai’s face, or in his voice. It was rare Kai got so unreadable. 

“Um… y-yeah. I- I don’t know… Like, it wasn’t a _bad_ kiss, and I’m like- I’m not into Nick. like they’re- they’re great, but they’re like…. Like a platonic soulmate, if that makes sense. Um… He’s one my best friends in the world.” Grant twisted the strings of his hoodie around his finger, thinking of all the horrid ways this conversation could end. 

“I mean, okay. Thanks for- for telling me. I… Why’d you kiss him?” Kai was watching him now, taking note of Grant’s posture and moving so he was sitting properly cross-legged on the couch, facing him. Grant looked back at him, and he couldn’t find any anger or frustration in his face or in his posture.

“I’m not sure I really have a reason, if I’m being honest. Cause he asked, I guess.” Grant stared down at his lap. He felt guilty, honestly. He shouldn’t feel guilty, it’s not like Kai _was_ his partner, but, it felt like he was. Which made Grant feel guilty for kissing Nick. 

“I mean, okay. Thanks for being honest, Grant, but, like… Don’t stress over it. It’s like- you do what you wanna do, I can’t control who you do and don’t smack face with.” Kai settled back into his slouched position. “I mean, unless it’s something you wanna talk about? I dunno. I’m bad at this sort of thing.” 

“You’re not like- even a little frustrated or something?” Grant pulled his mooshroom from it’s comfortable spot on the floor into his lap. The old plush flopped into his lap and rested there, just like it always did. 

“Pfft, no? Dude, why would I have any right to be upset with you for experimenting? I mean, yeah, we’ve both agreed to give dating a shot once life chills out, but, like, until then you’re free to do whatever. If we’re not officially dating yet, why stress about that kind of thing, ya know?’ Kai shrugged nonchalantly. And, as much as Grant knew he wanted to act like it didn’t bother him, like it was no big deal. Grant could see his trembling hands. He also knew Kai liked to avoid conflict even if it meant killing his own mental health. 

“Are you sure Kai? You’re doing that- that stand-offish thing you do.” Grant nudged him slightly. He didn’t want to force Kai to talk, but if Faerun had taught him anything it was that communication was always better than silence. He and Dad learned that lessons so many times it was engrained in his soul at this point. 

“Yeah, yeah. I’m- I’m fine, Grant. I’m just… I-I shouldn’t feel jealous, right? Like, I shouldn’t.” Kai looked guilty. So fucking guilty. Like he was the one who had caused an unforeseen hiccup in the plan of “Wait to start dating until Kai’s life is done being an absolute shit show,” which, he wasn’t. 

“You have a right to feel jealous, I mean… We kind of promised each other that we’d go for this thing once life settles down.” 

“Yeah! But, like, we’re not dating yet. You’re your own person and you can- you’re not tied to me. We’re just friends- complex as fuck friends, but friends!” 

“I think we’re like- platonic romance at this point.” Grant chuckled, trying to bring in just a hint of humor into the conversation so it didn’t feel so unbelievably tense. 

“Ha, yeah, I guess. I’m not mad at you! I- Please don’t think I’m mad at you.” 

“I wasn’t thinking that, don’t worry.” Grant smiled. This was going leagues better than he thought it would. Which, was fantastic. 

“I just- how do I…. I think I just kind of… Started auto-correcting you in my head to boyfriend? And, like, I _know_ that’s not right. I can’t handle that right now, with moving into Enne’s and trying to deal with the sperm donor and legal shit… I guess it’s just a comforting thought to know I have someone besides Mom in my corner. Someone more than just like ‘my best friend’… Am I making sense?” 

“Oh, deffo! I remember when I went through Faerun, I called Terry my big brother, cause he acts a lot like Daniel, and it felt so much more grounding to have a _brother_ in there with me than it did to just have _my good friend._ If boyfriend is what you wanna call me, go for it. Even if it’s just like- a title until further notice. I’m not expecting anything more out of you than you’re already giving me.” 

“I guess I’m just… Scared to mess this up. Like, I don’t- You had people around you make romance work and whatnot. My mom- my mom was scared of men and romance until like- I was in seventh grade. I never… Had that exposer.” 

“Your mom being so protective over you makes sense now, though, given what we know about you d- sperm donor. I mean, shit’s fucked.” 

“Yeah… We’re- Mom’s gonna try to get a restraining order… And officially divorce the bastard.” 

“They aren’t divorced?” Grant shifted slightly as Kai moved to lean against him, letting the boy lean into his arms and take comfort in the touch. Kai un-paused Minecraft and started playing again, not mentioning at Grant combed through his hair. 

“Nope. Mom ran away, so they never _officially_ divorced. Technically, my mom is still married to the guy. She never wanted to contact him to get him to sign the divorce papers. Legal shit’s dumb.” 

“Yeah, legal shit’s dumb. It was bad enough working out a divorce when my parents were on great terms and just were gay the whole time. Can’t imagine dealing with a shithead like your dad through a divorce.” Kai jumped over a ravine, muttering a cheer as he just barely made the parkour jump across. He seemed proud of himself. 

“It’s… Life, I guess. Not my fault the sperm donor’s a piece of shit, ya know?”

“You think you’d let Enne take legal custody of you once shit gets sorted with your dad? Like, in case something ever happened to Jeanne.” 

“I… I dunno.” He deflated slightly, moving so he was practically curled in Grant’s lap and sitting there solemnly. “I mean, I know my mom would leave custody of me to Enne if it came to it, she trusts them with everything. And they’ve proven they’re worth that trust. I just… I don’t know them well. To me they’re just… Mom’s datemate, ya know?” 

“Yeah, I get that. I wouldn’t wanna be dumped with Kelly if something happened to Mom.” Grant checked his phone as he felt it buzz in his pocket, trying his best not to disturb Kai.   
**_Teej:_ you and ****kai** **be ready to go to** **faerun** **in the morning. shit’s going down. i found jax. twins need our help.**  
Well, shit. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a wilson? actually communicating? absolutely preposterous. 
> 
> anyways, we'll have like.... two more chapters max. all of this is gonna wrap up nice and tidy really quickly. But so much fucking angst B)


	19. the one where it got a little too emotional

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw; mentions of death/suicide/suicide pact, implied/referenced self-harm

There was a palpable tension in the car as TJ drove the car through the thick forest of Faerun. It was dead silent, minus the fact TJ had an episode of My Brother, My Brother, and Me playing through the aux cord. Kai moved slightly to take Grant’s hand in his own, feeling the slight tremble Grant had in his hands. It was worrying to say the least. Kai wasn’t sure who ‘The Likely’s’ were, but judging from the uncomfortable air of the car, they weren’t anybody good. He sighed and leaned his head against Grant’s shoulder, listening to the wheezing laugh of… on the MBMBAM brothers. He couldn’t really tell them apart, he always preferred NADDPOD over the McElroys. 

“Course of action when we get there; deal with Jaxton, get Potentially to help us grab Sparrow and Krow, and get the fuck out. Get home and never fucking touch Faerun ever again because this whole thing was a bad idea.” Terry sounded frazzled. Sounded tired and strung tight, like he could snap under the pressure any second. Kai wondered if part of all of this stress was his fault from pushing the group to tell him about Faerun. He leveled that surely not, but the fear of such lingered in his soul.

“Jax is coming back with us, right?” Grant asked, leaning forward onto the back of Lark’s chair. Kai could see the numbers running through his head. There was just enough space in the minivan that Jaxton could sit in the back row with him and Grant, that assuming that Kestrel was staying in Faerun, which fey probably were. 

“That bastard hurt Sparrow and you want to bring him _back with us?”_ Lark spat, turning around in his chair. The anger in his eyes was more then just being frustrated. This was a genuine rage, and even Grant seemed a little startled by the sheer venom in Lark’s voice. “If you hadn’t been so fucking in love with the idea of that motherfucker, Grant, my sibling’s life wouldn’t be in danger! No, he’s not coming back with us! Don’t you care about Sparrow? What kind of batshit-” Nick reached across the aisle and set a hand on Lark’s arm. 

“Birdie, that’s not what he meant. Just chill out, Sparrow’s a strong kid, they can handle themself.” Lark huffed and turned back around, slumping in his seat and hitting the heels of his palms together without saying another word. Grant sighed and settled back into his seat too, holding onto Kai’s hand a little tighter. 

“Look, gang, we’re all a little on edge right now, but, we can scream and fight all we want when we get everyone home safe. Right now, please just- just tolerate each other until I can get you all home tonight.” Terry chastised, knuckles white from gripping the steering wheel. “And no snide pessimism, I’m getting you fuckers home and in bed safely, and I’ll do it by 10:30, y’all understand? If we aren’t home by my curfew, I will bring the wrath of fucking William Stampler down on your asses, get me?” The car obediently fell into silence, since really no one trusted each other to talk without it derailing into an argument at the moment.

* * *

The group had split in half shortly after that. TJ dropping Kai, Grant, and Nick near Ravenloft before they headed to Oakvale to try and implore Autumn's help. Which, was fine. Kai was fine with it. Until Grant told him the plan, that is. 

“Are we really going to have to fight Jax?” The thought made Kai’s skin crawl. Of hurting one of his very best friends for the sake of two kids he barely knew. He was already pretty pacifistic, and even more so in the context of Jaxton, who was supposed to be long dead. 

“I’m not sure we have a choice, KK. I mean… I know you don’t know Sparrow well, but, they… They mean the world to me.” Grant responded, trying hard not to look at Kai now.

Kai wasn’t sure where they were heading, all he really knew was that TJ had taken off with the car and Kai was getting tired of walking with no music or podcast or something to listen to while he did it. It was painfully boring. 

“Listen, Kyle, bud. I know that you have this pre-conceived notion of who Jaxton is in your head, but trust me buddy, when someone gets brought back in _Faerun?_ Every negative trait that person had is like- it’s times ten. Like- my grandad? I have some memories with him, yeah? He wasn’t awful. Wasn’t great, but wasn’t awful. My grandad in Faerun? Absolute shit-stain of a person. Period end of story.” Kai gets Nick was trying to help him out. He understands that this was Nick’s way of condolences. It wasn’t comforting. 

“Yeah, what Nick said.” Thanks Grant, for your thrilling contribution to the conversation. Really useful. 

“Could you please at least act hesitant to just fucking attack him? Like- Grant what did he ever do to deserve to get attacked?” You would’ve thought Kai just cursed the mother-fucking queen from how quickly Grant froze. He stopped dead, making Kai trip and stumble over himself for a moment before regaining his balance (god, those years of pointe class really go pay off. Thanks, Miss Linda) and turning to look at Grant. “What?” 

“Kai, have you stopped to think about us and Jaxton? Like, really think it?” Grant looked concerned. In more ways than one. 

“He’s Jaxton. Don’t tell me you’re- Grant you wanted to come find him! He's been dead! What could he have possibly done?” Kai felt the heat in his skin again. Just when he thought him and Grant you getting out of this bickering, they started another fight. Sure, he knew they’d be fine by tomorrow, but Kai was so sick of fighting. On all fronts. Just, entirely. Part of him wished life could exist without fighting. Legal fights, parental fights, mental fights, friend fights, physical fights, any other kind of fight. 

“Kai, I wanted to find Jaxton so I could- so I could confront him. On all the fucked up shit he did.” Grant reached for his hand. Kai pulled away, looking at the hand Grant reached toward them, then to Grant’s face. He felt betrayed in a way. A way he wasn’t sure how to describe. 

“What do you mean ‘confront him’? What did he ever do to you? Huh? He-” 

“He- Kai… He- where do I start?” Grant brushed his hands on his pant legs, fidgeting and toying with anything on his person that he could. “He didn’t- he wasn’t _good_ , Kai. Not- not the Jaxton we knew. He wasn’t bad, but he’s not good. He’s not a good person.” Kai noted how Nick stepped closer to Grant, noted how he placed a hand on Grant’s back to comfort him. 

“If that’s what you think.” Kai spat, turning right back around. He didn’t know where he was walking. He just needed to walk away. He couldn’t think about this right now. 

“Kai! Kai Alexander! Kai!” Grant raced back up next to him, trying to talk to him. To explain it to him. But, Kai didn’t want explanation. He didn’t. He felt angry, pissed off in a way he rarely was. He hadn’t been this angry since… Since Jaxton left him behind. 

“Fuck, Grant…” Kai was vaguely aware Nick was awkwardly standing to the back, letting the two work out whatever this was in peace without his ‘Close Charm’ as he likes to call it. And, there it was. The hot tears in his eyes. What he’d taken to calling ‘wet anger,’ the kind of anger when you’re just so fucking livid all you can do it cry and yell. “I just- okay! Jaxton wasn’t perfect! No shit, Sherlock! We were in middle school! I thought Kalvin Garrah was _good_ and _a role model_ in middle school! We all did shit we aren’t proud of! What are you gonna do? Hold a grudge against him our entire lives? So, what? He hurt your feelings a couple times. Tough shit, Grant! He’s dead! He’s been dead! He- he killed himself without us! Whoopie fucking doo, Grant! You can’t be mad he broke the pact forever, okay? He’s _gone_ and we’re still here! That’s gotta mean something to you!” 

“What do you mean ‘without you’? Grant what is he talking about?” Nick stepped forward now, pushing Kai back slightly, concern and fear and worry and so many emotions on his face Kai couldn’t tell what he was thinking. 

“Nothing, Nick. It’s nothing it’s just-” Grant rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, refusing to look Nick in the eyes. 

“Grant did you have fucking _suicide pact?”_ The following silence was deafening. The kind of silence that made your skin crawl and your chest close in and your blood pressure rise. The kind of silence that felt like a million voices screaming all at once and at the same time nothing at all. And as the silence went on, Nick’s rigid posture gave way to defeat, shock. Kai thinks he saw tears in his eyes. “Oh my fucking god.. Grant I-” 

“I’m not- I’m better. I’m better now.” Kai hadn’t heard Grant sound so… Small, since Jaxton’s funeral. Since the two of them sat silently at their best friend’s grave and mourned him together. “I’ve been better. I just-” 

“But you-”

“I… I had a plan.” Grant chuckled, arms coming up to wrap around himself in a bittersweet hug as he choked down a sob. A secret he desperately tried to keep forcing it’s way to the surface faster than he was ready. “I- I’m.. I’m clean. I was clean before he died, too. I- I’m at eighteen months. I just- we had a promise. That- that if one of us went out, we’d all three go out together. And I-” 

“Grant, that’s not why you told me you wanted to confront him.” Nick interjected. he was unreadable, whatever was going through Nick Close’s head, Kai had no idea. and Kai doesn’t think Grant did either. “Ya know what? We’ll unpack this later. Grant, I love you. I- thank you. For telling me. But, this conversation isn’t done. We just have people counting on us, and you bet your _ass_ we’re talking about this later. With the rest of the Doodlers.” Nick turned back to Kai, looking him over. “How about you?” 

“I never- I was just-” Kai wasn’t sure how to word his play in the whole pact. Sure, if Jaxton and Grant were going down, he would’ve gone down with them. That was the plan but he wasn’t going to- 

“Kai wasn’t part of it. He never was. Jax and I were the unstable ones.” Grant provided for him, making him grateful he didn’t have to supply the words himself. Nick watched the two of them suspiciously, like he was running calculations in his head. Whatever conclusion he came to, he seemed content with it. Nick sighed as he reached forward to hug Grant. 

“I love you, Wilson. Just- no secrets, kay? Any non-Faerun shit you’ve done? It literally cannot be worse than the Lord of Chaos.” Nick let him go, not giving Grant a moment to respond before yanking Kai into a hug to. “You too, shrimp. Secrets do not exist with Nick Close, I always find out, baby.” 

Kai snickered, letting himself be held for a moment before Nick let him go, “yeah, yeah, I get’cha, Nick. Let’s just- what are we going to do now?” 

“We need to go get Jaxton’s ass, is what we need to go do.” Grant stated, using his hoodie sleeve to wipe tears from his eyes and shaking out his hands while he took a deep breath. “Let’s call Terry, check in with them, then go get his ass.” 

“I second that decision.” Nick smiled, giving Kai another quick side-hug before _officially_ letting him go (with a hair ruffle for good measure, of course). It felt weird, being so friendly to Nick when just yesterday he felt like strangling the guy for kissing his kind-of-boyfriend-thing, but Kai guessed that’s just how the cookie crumbled sometimes. “What about you, Kai?” 

“Oh! Uh… Thiiirded? Thirded! Let’s call Terry.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi fun fact about this chapter is that there's an entire missing scene cause I accidentally deleted it transferring to post and then decided to say fuck it and posted it anyway because i think it'd be neat to have that in the final chapter anyways. 
> 
> I've had this Grant convo planned since I conceived the idea of Jaxton, so... we'll see how this goes.


End file.
